This is really just beyond the pale.

Everyone knows that Post critic Tom Shales can't stand Christiane Amanpour and has what is now officially a creepy obsession with belittling her work. Shales began his rather unsightly campaign back in March when ABC announced Amanpour would be taking over as host of ABC's This Week on Sundays. (Shales objected to the Amanpour choice because conservatives objected. Or something.)

So naturally when Amanpour made her debut this weekend, Shales panned her work. (She's too foreign!) And yes, he did it in weirdly personal and catty way, referring to Amanpour as a “globe-trotting Fancy-Pants.”

But this slight from Shales' critique was particularly hateful, uncalled for, and completely unprofessional [emphasis added]:

Perhaps in keeping with the newly globalized program, the commendable “In Memoriam” segment ended with a tribute not to American men and women who died in combat during the preceding week but rather, said Amanpour in her narration, in remembrance of “all of those who died in war” in that period. Did she mean suggest that our mourning extend to members of the Taliban?

Are you kidding me? Shales really suggested that on her network debut, Amanpour gave a shout-out to members of the Taliban who died in combat last week? What is wrong with this man and when will Shales have the decency to extend an apology to Amanpour?

Here's the full clip of Amanpour's “In Memoriam” segment. Shales must have been the only viewer on the planet who thought Amanpour was honoring fallen terrorists on ABC yesterday.

UPDATED: Not surprisingly, Shales' cowardly attack, which he had to invent, has been picked up by the right-wing media haters. Here, Newsbusters claims Amanpour would “mourn Taliban deaths.”