Networks Pull Plug on Teresa's Speech

The three major broadcast networks have pulled the plug on tonight's Democratic convention speech by Teresa Heinz Kerry - just two days after she went off the deep end by telling a report to "shove it" as TV cameras rolled.

ABC, NBC and CBS have decided to draw the curtain on Teresa's big night, canceling live coverage of tonight's proceedings altogether, as fears mount among Democrats that Heinz Kerry, a loose cannon who either bores audiences with her slow, monotonous drone or shocks them by talking about her Botox injections and other indelicate topics, will say something inappropriate.

Political campaign consultants tend to fear personalities like hers, notes USA Today, because they throw the campaign off-message.

That's exactly what happened Sunday night, when Teresa's "shove it" outburst took the spotlight away from her husband's trip to Fenway Park to throw out the first pitch.

And despite much-ballyhooed speeches Monday night by both Bill and Hillary Clinton, the most talked-about moment of the convention so far continues to be Teresa's temper tantrum.

"I don't think this is the time for quirky," said Terry Madonna, a political analyst at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa., noting that while Heinz Kerry will still speak, she will read from a prepared text under strict instructions not to ad-lib.

Still, the pro-Kerry editors at the networks are playing it safe, just in case Teresa's temper flares again.