The Right seat on KCRW's Left, Right and Center is a hard spot to keep filled. Newest to try, starting with this Friday's show, will be Clifford May, president of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. He's the former director of communications for the Republican National Committee and an ex-newspaper and magazine scribe. He spent a decade at the New York Times as a foreign and Washington correspondent and as an editor of the magazine. May later was Associate Editor of the Rocky Mountain News, and also has Newsweek, PBS and Geo in his past. In his role as KCRW's debate partner butting heads with Robert Scheer, Arianna Huffington and (to a lesser degree) Matt Miller, he replaces John O'Sullivan, who had just replaced David Frum in February.

May sat in for O'Sullivan last Friday, and I guess it went well. He has already signed up to do a live LR&C for station donors Nov. 15 at the Hammer Museum. The shows air on Fridays at 2:30 and 7 p.m.