Beltway celebs sweat details in ‘Jeopardy!’

WASHINGTON — Things learned while observing a day’s worth of taping of “Celebrity Jeopardy!” with a bunch of wonks, talkers and other media types the show labels as Washington’s “power players”:

* Tucker Carlson (of CNN’s “Crossfire”) is disturbingly well versed in things related to “homemaking,” like dust bunnies and Brillo pads.

* Bob Woodward (of the Washington Post) needs faster thumbs.

* And it takes $20,000 each (for charity, that is) to get these “power players” -- the types who make a living telling us what we should think, or what we should know -- to go on national television and risk mass mortification.

“The potential for humiliation exists whether you’re famous or unemployed living in a truck,” says John Podhoretz, who was a “Jeopardy!” champion after making his name in Washington as a speechwriter for President Reagan. “But I suppose there’s more potential if you’re well-known for being intelligent.”

The lineup for this week’s shows (weeknights at 7 on KABC-TV Channel 7) includes Peggy Noonan (former presidential speechwriter), Maria Bartiromo (CNBC), Ari Fleischer (former White House press secretary), Aaron Brown (CNN’s “NewsNight”), Keith Olbermann (MSNBC’s “Countdown”), Tavis Smiley (NPR and PBS) and Tim Russert (NBC’s “Meet the Press”).

During the tapings here last month, Smiley groused that he should have been invited on “The Price Is Right” or “Family Feud” instead of what he termed “the brainiac show.”

Noonan fretted that her scoop-neck shirt (under a pale pink jacket) was cut too low. Carlson predicted much gloom and doom.

“Oh, I lose!” he said, when asked about his competition. “My feeling was that, hosting ‘Crossfire,’ I could do politics. Then I find out it’s Peggy Noonan and Bob Woodward. And I was hoping for the dumb people.”

Hmmmm. Who, pray tell, qualified as “the dumb people” in Carlson’s book?

“Um, well, it’s like pornography,” he answered. “I know it when I see it.”

Noonan called Woodward a “killer.”

“He keeps saying things like ‘I’m getting a little older, so it takes me a little longer to think,’ ” Noonan said, scoffing.

Actually, it was the reflexes, not the brain, that stymied Woodward on occasion. Two answers directly related to him: “Deep Throat” and “All the President’s Men” (the movie in which Robert Redford stars as Woodward), and both times he was beaten to the buzzer.