He is Craig Carton, and his proudest moment on the New Jersey airwaves probably came in 2005, when a sitting Governor threatened to beat him up after Mr. Carton said that women like the Governor’s wife, who suffered from postpartum depression, “must be crazy in the first place” and needed medical marijuana to keep themselves from “putting their babies in the microwave.”

"At the end of the day, the integrity of our company and the respect that you feel for CBS becomes the most important consideration," CBS C.E.O. Les Moonves said when he fired Mr. Imus back in May, a noble sentiment that he apparently didn’t actually mean, given the primitive on-air caricaturing of minority groups that helped Mr. Carton make his name in the Garden State—and attract the kind of ratings that caught CBS’s eye.

But what is most dispiriting about Mr. Carton’s hiring is not CBS’s hypocrisy or even the fact that so vile and calculating a character has been rewarded with a top-market job and a lucrative contract. It’s that CBS’ decision marks the death of quality political conversation in a prime venue. For nearly two decades, Mr. Imus’ WFAN radio show served as a showcase for a cross-ideological mix of prominent and colorful political voices, with a mishmash of literary and sports figures tossed in for good measure. Rick Santorum would stop by just as frequently as Chris Dodd. Mary Matalin would praise the Bush administration in one segment, while Tom Oliphant would bury it in the next. The roster of guests—Tim Russert, John McCain, John Kerry, and Frank Rich were among the eclectic bunch of regulars‐was as politically diverse as it was relevant.

And almost always, the interviews made for compelling listening. Mr. Imus’ on-air sidekicks—the ones who recklessly egged him on when he launched into his notorious riff on the Rutgers women’s basketball team—would take a backseat and Mr. Imus would go one-on-one with his guest, treating them with a level of respect that would stun anyone who knows him solely by the Rutgers controversy. He gave them space to make their points and asked intelligent questions, displaying a political (or literary, for that matter) fluency that would surprise non-listeners.

But what made Imus interviews unique and enjoyable was the host’s readiness to sniff out spin and political posture and, when appropriate, to make his guests—master manipulators all—squirm with razor-sharp follow-ups. Chuck Schumer, for instance, appeared this spring as the scandal over the conditions at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center was breaking. Mr. Schumer, the skilled attack dog, began rattling off his familiar castigations of the Bush administration and the G.O.P., laying the failures at their feet. But Mr. Imus, who had rained his own outrage on the G.O.P., refused to let Mr. Schumer treat the scandal as a political football.

Instead, he bore into him, demanding to know when he’d last visited Walter Reed, until Mr. Schumer sheepishly admitted that he hadn’t been since before the start of the Iraq War. When Mr. Schumer then noted that he’d visited veterans’ hospitals in New York and seen the conditions there and introduced bills to address it, Mr. Imus pointed out—and Mr. Schumer, reluctantly agreed—that he hadn’t actually accomplished anything. Finally, Mr. Imus reminded Mr. Schumer of his vote to authorize the Iraq War, then asked him why he wouldn’t “go over to Walter Reed…to see the consequence of your vote.”

“You know, probably I should have gone there,” Mr. Schumer finally confessed, having been shamed into putting the football away.

Variations of the Schumer episode played out on the Imus show regularly, with Democrats and Republicans alike. That was Mr. Imus at his best—not wed to either party or to a particular ideology, but simply channeling the listening audience’s fatigue with the condescension and hypocrisy of the political class. Guests who respected the maturity and intelligence of the audience came off well. Those who didn’t—well, again, there’s the Schumer example.

Mr. Imus’ downfall, of course, was what would transpire between guests, when he’d give free reign to his on-air sidekicks, a group of white men who’d perform skits and engage in banter that mainly relied on crude racial, ethnic and sexual stereotyping. When their antics would provoke media scrutiny, Mr. Imus’s crew invariably claimed that it was all in good fun—of the equal opportunity offending variety. But even to regular listeners, it was hardly clear that they were joking. Mostly, Mr. Imus would sit back and let them go at it, playfully objecting for show—not to actually put a stop to it. But other times—as he did on that fateful day when sidekick Bernard McGuirk began ridiculing the Rutgers team—he would join in.

But at least with Mr. Imus and his newsmaker interviews, CBS had half of a great show. In Mr. Carton, CBS has tapped someone who lacks Mr. Imus’ political I.Q. and who has, instead, built his entire broadcast career on the kind of cheap, grade school-level taunts and insults that were the calling card of Mr. Imus’s co-hosts.

Contrast, for example, Mr. Imus’s efforts to spotlight the plight of America’s wounded Iraq veterans with Mr. Carton’s signature political projects in New Jersey.

There was, for instance, his effort last year to identify and expose politicians who are gay, inviting listeners to provide tips and offering protection to gay elected officials if they would sign a statement that he promised to keep confidential. This was, of course, presented as a humorous exercise – which it was, for those who still think that the fact of someone’s sexual orientation is itself a punchline. There was also the time he waded into local politics in Edison, New Jersey, a township of about 90,000 people, many of whom are Asian immigrants. Several weeks before an election in 2005, Mr. Carton turned his attention to Jun Choi, a 34-year-old Korean-American who was running for mayor.

“Chinese should never dictate the outcome of an election!” Mr. Carton thundered, apparently confusing Mr. Choi’s ethnicity.

“Well, go to A.C. for a week and try and get a table,” the host continued, assuming a crude Chinese accent, “‘Ching-chong, ching-chong, ching-chong.’ You hit it on 17, you stupid bitch! The dealer's got a 5! I’m holding an 18. What're you hitting for?! You know?”

When a caller from Edison told Mr. Carton that he’d decided to leave town because “we’re being overrun,” Mr. Carton replied, “Damn Orientals and Indians!”

Mr. Choi, no doubt powered by the public backlash against Mr. Carton’s tirade, ended up winning an upset victory. But of Mr. Carton’s effort at vigilantism takes the cake. Earlier this year, as talk radio across the country embraced the crusade against illegal immigration, Mr. Carton inaugurated “Operation La Cucha Gotcha,” in which he deputized his listeners to report anyone they even suspected of being an illegal immigrant to authorities, creating a climate of hysterical scape-goating that surely intimidated many of New Jersey’s perfectly legal immigrants. Mr. Imus and Mr. Carton actually reached fairly similar, male-dominated audiences. But Mr. Imus, before he went off the air, treated his listeners to numerous interviews on the immigration debate, providing reasoned and informed dialogues on what has become an emotionally-explosive topic. Mr. Carton took that same topic and stoked his audience’s fears for ratings.

With Craig Carton, CBS will probably get the ratings it wants. But those who enjoy a touch of intelligence with their political talk would do well to look elsewhere.

We'll wait till we hear it sourced to CBS Radio, which chucked Imus' top-rated morning show after he referred to the Rutgers women's basketball team as "nappy-headed 'hos," before deleting the question-mark.

The Rosetta stone for deciphering Park Slope stroller mommies and Upper East Side Type-A's would join other media joints that have made a commercial home in the once-struggling Soho slice, including WNYC and CBS Radio; Viacom, too, plans a move to Hudson Square.

- Tom Acitelli

Viacom, which counts MTV and Paramount Pictures among its many assets, is closing in on between 200,000 and 250,000 square feet, said Jason Pizer, the director of leasing at Trinity Real Estate, Hudson Square’s dominant landlord.

Although he said the lease has not been signed and that negotiations are still ongoing, he confirmed the lease-out and said a closed deal “is not far away.”

And just what does stand between a lease-out and a signed one? To Mr. Pizer, greedy owners.

“You know, with some owners, a better deal comes along and they’ll take that old lease and rip it up and start negotiating with a new party,” he said. “At Trinity, we like to think that once there’s a lease-out, we’re going to close the deal.”

Viacom has more than one million square feet in the Times Square area, including the painted glass façade splayed on shows like TRL every day. The company, with addresses sprawled all over Broadway, including 1515 Broadway, has been actively searching for new space, considering everything from renegotiating a deal in midtown to flocking to New Jersey.

If the Hudson Square deal is signed, it could be the first in a series of moves for Viacom, which has been looking for more breathable rents in a media-friendly submarket.

Meanwhile, an enormous lease with a powerhouse tenant could put the Hudson Square submarket more prominently on Manhattan’s commercial map. The vacancy rate for Class A space there is a staggeringly high 18 percent, according to a fourth-quarter 2006 report by brokerage Cushman & Wakefield. In the rest of Manhattan, vacancy rates are half that or less.

The Viacom deal would be the biggest under Carl Weisbrod’s watch as Trinity’s president, a watch that began in 2005.

One of the firm’s biggest deals came last month, when CBS Radio signed a lease for 75,000 square feet. (CBS Radio isn’t part of Viacom any longer, after a split between Viacom and the CBS Corporation.)

That deal came on the heels of WNYC Radio’s 2006 lease of 71,000 feet in 10 Hudson Square. And Clear Channel consolidated 121,000 square feet in a Rudin-controlled building just south of Canal Street, at 32 Avenue of the Americas, in December.

At a time when the media is shredding employees and redeploying space, cheap rents are a must.

When CBS Radio signed its 20-year deal for the 10th and 11th floors at 345 Hudson Street, the company agreed to pay rents of $34.50 a square foot for the first five years, $37.25 in the next five years, $40.75 for the next five, and $43.75 for the last five, according to a source familiar with that deal.

But not every deal has gone smoothly at 345 Hudson. Home Depot had been close to a lease there for 100,000 square feet, but the hardware chain got cold feet, and now that deal’s dead.

Representing Viacom in the deal is Michael Laginestra and Scott Gottlieb of CB Richard Ellis. They both declined to comment.

TAKE THAT, EQUINOX! TOWN SPORTS, which controls omnipresent gym New York Sports Club, has found its new headquarters.

Town Sports will move into a 28,000-square-foot home at 5 Penn Plaza, across the street from Madison Square Garden.

The rents are a considerable break from what the company pays now at Vornado-controlled 888 Seventh Avenue, said its leasing broker, Greg Taubin of Studley.

Mr. Taubin said that the Studley brokers were able to lock in rents in the mid-$30’s a foot at a building where rents have swelled to the high $40’s. Meanwhile, asking rents at the building Town Sports is fleeing are in the mid-$80’s.

In addition to Mr. Taubin, David Goldstein, Robert Graubard and Jason Perla worked on this deal. Mr. Goldstein, the executive vice president, like so many at Studley, is in Costa Rica this week, toasting to major leasing deals cut last year. Peter Turchin and Zachary Freeman of CBRE represented 5 Penn Plaza’s landlord, Stephen Haymes.

AS BROKERS MADE THEIR WAY THROUGH the boozy haze that was the Real Estate Board of New York’s annual banquet last week, each received a booklet with a seating chart.

Inside the 43-page booklet, there was precisely one ad, which was a sparkling artist’s rendition of the new 100 Park Avenue.

Of all the building’s new amenities—like a new glass façade—there was only one fact listed twice, on two separate pages: The building will come complete with 160,000 contiguous square feet.

It’s just more evidence of how much landlords are trying to get the word out about whatever bigger lumps of space they can pull together.

“There’s a substantial need for space,” said Alex Chudnoff, the Cushman & Wakefield leasing broker at 100 Park, “and there’s a very limited amount of it out there.”

So much so that Mr. Chudnoff anted up and said that 100 Park Avenue could have something closer to 400,000 square feet available.

Finding big blocks in midtown is an exacting challenge. That’s why brokers are itching to get the word out as soon as possible.

Other new blocks just getting out there: Vornado Real Estate has gone out of its way to tell brokers that a 400,000-square-foot block will be available at 909 Third Avenue, at 55th Street. The space won’t be available until 2009, but if it came out today, it would be one of the biggest blocks out there, so there really is never too early a time to market.

This need also spurred Tishman Speyer to unfurl early its ad campaign for 229 West 43rd Street. The space, the soon-to-be former New York Times headquarters, won’t be ready until next year, but the landlord’s just keeping tenants on call for the more than 746,000 feet that will become available.

The biggest midtown block out there now is at Sheldon Solow’s 380 Madison, which has more than 500,000 square feet marketed through CB Richard Ellis, according to CoStar.

Of course, with landlords eager to lock in long-term leases and tenants eager to get a deal now rather than pay even more later, both sides are looking for that big space—and quickly.

But here's some new information that everyone loves: Rent numbers!

CBS will take the 10th and 11th floors with rents starting at $34.50 a square foot for the first five years, $37.25 in the next five years, $40.75 for the next five, and $43.75 for the last five, according to a source familiar with the deal. CBS will get the first five months free as well as a promise of future work on the Hudson Square space from the landlord, Trinity Real Estate.

Wonder how these numbers will affect Home Depot's strategy. The retail giant, according to various media including Real Estate Weekly, has been dragging its feet on signing a 107,000-square-foot deal at 345 Hudson.

- John Koblin