Matt Taibbi’s job interview:

“Okay,” he said. “It’s Monday morning. There were no late-breaking stories on Sunday night. The president is in Belize, attending an international conference on greenhouse gases. What are you looking for when you scan the wires on the way to work?”

“That’s easy,” I said. “A blond white child trapped in a dumpster.”

“Where?”

“Anywhere,” I said. “Montana. Missouri. Florida. It’ll probably be Florida – that’s the first place I’ll look.”

“Okay,” he said. “What are your top three standup locations?”

“All right,” I said. “One, outside the idyll suburban home from whence he was snatched. You’ll want the still-ajar window in the shot. Two, in front of the police barriers at the nearby landfill where, sources say, a search with ‘cadaver dogs’ is being conducted. Three, outside the squalid home/trailer of the ‘person of interest.’ If there’s no overturned Big Wheel in the foreground, buy one.”

I always like the narrative value of the refrigerator on the front porch shot, but that may have more of an Alabama flavor to it.