STERN: I'LL TAKE LETTERMAN SLOT
**Update**
MorningDrive radio topper Howard Stern declared Thursday: "I'll take over the Letterman show... if the money is right!"
As first reported in this space, top CBS executives are eyeing Stern as a replacement for David Letterman if the latenight host jumps to ABC.
While CBS suits have grown more convinced that Letterman will stay at the network -- a contingency plan to launch Stern in the slot has been secretly developed, a top source said from New York.
"Stern is at the very top of a very short list," said the insider.
"I'll take the slot!" Stern said in an on-air interview with the DRUDGE REPORT Thursday morning. "I'd do it. If the money is right. Every time I guest on Letterman or Leno, I get the highest ratings. So why not?"
CBS this week offered David Letterman $31.5 million a year to stay on as LATE SHOW host, upping an offer of $30 million ABC has reportedly made to get him to defect.
But Stern, a friend of Letterman, said the toothed-host will not be making the trip down Broadway to Times Square.
"Letterman is not going anywhere, he's staying at CBS," Stern told the DRUDGE REPORT. "He was never going to leave. He's been using the newspapers in his contract talks. Of course he's not going anywhere. He leaked all this stuff about ABC.... It was Machiavellian. They all fell for it."
A top CBS source said Thursday morning that no Letterman deal has yet been finalized.
Developing...
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Shucks. No Howard on late-night. Guess I'm stuck with the radio show.