You Just Can't Do It Without Yiddish

Here is an analysis of why Katie Couric could succeed as the new CBS anchorwoman, but notice that without a Yiddishism, it isn't perfect:-

Not because she’s the first woman to anchor a network newscast alone...No, the real brilliance—in this age of The Daily Show— is that she’s the first network anchor to have a quick, smart, mischievous sense of humor as a major part of her public persona. She has all the serious-news experience the job requires, but it’s her lack of old-fashioned TV-news “gravitas”—that perpetual default to careful, po-faced grown-up solemnity that any moron can fake—which makes her special.

If it’s possible to rejuvenate TV news, Couric is among the last best hopes.

...“Those days are over when you have that guy sitting behind the desk who everyone believes to the nth degree.” That’s not quite right. People still want to believe in news anchors. That nth degree of credibility, however, is achieved these days not by some quasi hottie’s stilted channeling of Chet Huntley or Walter Cronkite, but by a smart person who comes across as more or less normal on the air. Another of the early notions Moonves encouraged was making Jon Stewart an anchor—wrong person, right direction.

...First of all, it’s a truism—as well as true (or at least truthy)—that people are hungry for authenticity in their public figures. And a good sense of humor is the most reliable contemporary signifier of authenticity. Humor combined with menschiness and a degree of convincing moral engagement...