If you’re a regular reader of this column, you know I’ve assigned a possibly irrational level of importance to John Malone‘s recent musings about the future of CNN. The media mogul called on the network to dial back its opinion programming, “actually have journalists’” and “evolve back to the kind of journalism that it started with”—itself a critique that I find notable in light of Malone’s impending influence as a board director at CNN’s future parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery. I thought I had spilled all the ink there was to spill on those remarks—Malone is neither C.E.O. of Warner Bros. Discovery, nor president of CNN, and he’ll be one board member among thirteen—and yet I found myself thinking of those words once again when I heard that the distinguished newsman Chris Wallace was leaving Fox News to join CNN’s new streaming service, CNN+.

I don’t want to read too far into Wallace’s move. Like others who have decamped from Fox recently, he had become alarmed and discouraged by the network’s tolerance for falsehoods, conspiracy theories, and culture war provocation, and didn’t have enough sway to do much about it. (A plea from Wallace, Bret Baier, and others to Fox News leadership over Tucker Carlson’s incendiary “Patriot Purge” documentary appears to have fallen on deaf ears.) In an industry dominated by five news networks—Fox, CNN, NBC, ABC, and CBS—there are only so many places that a 74-year-old fourth-place Sunday show host can go besides retirement. By the same token, there are only so many camera-ready anchors that a cable news chief like Jeff Zucker can hire. In other words, I wouldn’t go looking for evidence of some grand CNN+ strategy here. Wallace needed a home; CNN always needs talent.