Watching Jeopardy! is one of my daily rituals. But it still doesn’t sit right with me that Ken Jennings won the gig of exclusive host by crossing a picket line.

Recently a decades-old clip of Jennings making a vaguely populist gibe against corporate bosses made the rounds on social media, prompting a lot of “Based Ken” replies. Like a true Debbie Downer, I felt compelled to point out that “Nevertheless, the only reason he’s the sole host of Jeopardy is that he crossed the Writers Guild picket line when Mayim Bialik would not.”

Most of the responses I’ve received were intellectually lazy and dishonest. I’m not going to respond 299 characters at a time, so I’m firing up the old blog.

What most of the posts defending Jennings’ picket line crossing really boil down to is that people on the left hated Mayim Bialik. She’s a Zionist, vaccine skeptic with weird “mommy” politics. I’ll be honest. When she and Jennings split the hosting duties from 2021-2023, I kinda liked her infectious enthusiasm for the contestants and found his ESPN-style commentary about game play and betting (plus his obvious love for incessant tournaments of repeat contestants) to be slightly irksome. Continue reading “This…Is…Picket Line Jeopardy!”