HURRICANE ROSIE - OUT TO SEA

Once again Rosie O'Donnell has done it. She's managed to take a pretty cool gig and destroy it but exposing the nation to her ... well, ... Rosieness.

On Wednesday, the portly 45 year-old comedienne announced she's leaving the popular daytime ABC gabfest “The View” after a season. Is anyone shocked? I figured this would happen back when Rosie pissed of The Donald a few months back. And once once Babs Walters was dragged into the mud, that was it.

Rosie's goose was cooked.

You don't piss off Babs. Moreover, you don't piss her off publicly.

“It wasn't surprising. I don't think anyone was surprised,” Vanity Fair media writer Michael Wolff said Thursday on NBC's TODAY. “Rosie's become a shock jock. She is a shock jock. And what we know about shock jocks is that they attract an enormous amount of attention and everyone holds their breath. ‘What's going to go wrong? Is the roof going to cave in?’ ”

So, that said, O'Donnell, announced on Wednesday's show that that she decided to leave “The View” as co-host when her contract expires in June. I swear, I predicted this month's ago. No one believed me.

So ... In that cool and calm damage-control mode, co-host and executive producer Walters (at left) said that O'Donnell's departure was not her decision or choice, but speculation runs rampant that O'Donnell is being pushed out because of her uncontrollable tongue and fallout over her nasty public feud with billionaire real estate mogul Donald Trump.

Well, yeah ...

“Rosie has said this is all about a contract extension dispute, that she just wanted one year and ABC wanted three. You're not buying that?” TODAY anchor Meredith Vieira, a former co-host of “The View,” asked Wolff.

“Let me put it simply: Baloney,” the media critic responded. “I think they were both forcing each other. I'm sure that ABC said to her, ‘If we are going to go on, there has to be something different here. We have to put some controls on you. We have to make you a little more predictable.’ ”
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Did her antics lead to departure?
As co-host of “The View,” O'Donnell quickly became known for her sharp tongue and willingness to engage in controversy, including the famous flap with Trump that made front-page tabloid headlines for weeks. She made fun of his infamous comb-over and questioned the roots and depth of his success. He responded, in a nutshell, that she is fat and a failure.
But, here are some of the more controversial clips, of late:













And then she picks on poor little Elisabeth Hasselback.