Will George Leave This Week for GMA?

"Will Host Switch Horses as 'Week' Gains Ground?" Tom Shales Wash Post:  Every week, publicists at ABC News crow about chunks chipped away from the NBC lead on Sunday mornings. On Nov. 1, ABC continued to shrivel the gap: Nielsen figures show 3,140,000 viewers sticking with "Meet the Press" and 2,750,000 watching "This Week" (the shows do not air directly opposite each other in every market).

• A year ago, the gap between NBC's haughty front-runner and ABC's scrappy contender was 1,090,000; now it's down to 390,000 viewers, a clear and dramatic change. Improvement on this scale suggests it's a mere matter of time before "This Week" regains the top spot it had when David Brinkley, the legendary newsman for whom the show was created (by Roone Arledge, longtime ABC News and Sports president), was its polite, proper and popular star.
• One might assume he'd want to stay with "This Week" as it wends its way to the top (though "wending" may be too mild a verb), then preside triumphantly over the victory. And yet industry sources say he is giving serious consideration to "GMA," where he'd replace the ever-incandescent Diane Sawyer. Sawyer is fleeing the early hours to take over ABC's evening "World News" show when Charlie Gibson steps down in January.
• Any discussion of "Meet the Press" as a competitor must include one pivotal acknowledgment -- the sudden death in 2008 of the program's moderator and guiding light, Tim Russert. "Meet the Press" showed new vitality under his rule and renewed popularity as Russert blew away accumulated dust. David Gregory, promoted to the show's top spot, does not look happy in the assignment; if anything, he gives the appearance of being annoyed by constraints, longing to be out in the world chasing stories. The kindest things to say about Gregory are that he comes across as over-qualified and yet underachieving.