Blond, witchy, mindlessly politically correct, and throwing nasty tantrums? Does that bring Elisabeth Hasselbeck to mind? It does to Washington Post TV critic Tom Shales (who just hailed Barack Obama as "every inch President Wonderful" yesterday.) His review of the new ABC sitcom In The Motherhood hailed comic actresses Cheryl Hines and Megan Mullally, but there’s a third star to be saluted:

But there's one more funny mother involved: Jessica St. Clair as Emily, blond and, well, witchy. This character comes across as less likable than the other two, perhaps because she's depicted as adhering mindlessly to political correctness and also throws nasty tantrums when something ticks her off.

She looks and acts a little like Elizabeth Hasselbeck of "The View." In fact, "In the Motherhood" is sort of "The View" with mommies, and a script.

In the premiere, the Hasselbeck stand-in tells her little kids Santa Claus isn’t real: "Emily and her husband, determined to bring up their children by the book -- whichever book is currently in vogue -- decide that it's lying to let the kids continue to believe in Santa Claus. Cleaning up this lie results in confusion, hurt feelings and preschool pandemonium."

I wonder if The View will bring this up today, so they can defend Elisabeth (and promote an ABC sitcom, wink wink). The only redeeming quality in this odd review is Shales noticing that the show’s jokes are too dirty to repeat in a family newspaper, even if he wants to be too cool to object:

The sex jokes are bawdy enough that they can't really be repeated here, and yet "Motherhood" is an 8 o'clock "family hour" show. Nobody seems to care much about that any more. Besides, when a show is genuinely funny, who wants to carp about racy references?

—Tim Graham is Director of Media Analysis at the Media Research Center.