CNN snips Maher.

After the GOP took a beating at the polls last month, the Republican National Committee canned chairman Ken Mehlman. But even though he's out of a job, it seems the mysterious Mehlman can still make a media titan shake in its boots. After Bill Maher suggested Mehlman liked guys on Larry King's November 8 show, CNN edited out Maher's "outing" from the rebroadcast and removed the reference from the show's transcript on CNN.com. "When someone says something potentially defamatory, we typically won't be liable for it," a CNN spokeswoman told The Advocate. "However, if we continue to rebroadcast it without any reporting of our own, we could be legally responsible for what that guest said."

For the record, here is the unedited Larry King Live exchange:

BM: Well, there's a couple of big people who I think everyone in Washington knows [are gay] who run the Republican--

LK: You will name them?

BM: Well, I wouldn't be the first. I'd get sued if I was the first. Ken Mehlman--OK, there's one I think people have talked about. I don't think he's denied it when he's been--people have suggested; he doesn't say.

LK: I never heard that. I'm walking around in a fog. I never--Ken Mehlman? I never heard that. But the question is--

BM: Maybe you don't go to the same bathhouse I do, Larry.

The Advocate contacted Ken Mehlman, who had no comment.