'24' prez — evil genius?

Holy cow! Turns out that President Charles Logan isn't a bumbling coward, he's an evil genius!

This week's episode of "24" at least led us to believe that Logan (Gregory Itzin), who's seemed overmatched since he became acting president in the middle of last season, is behind this season's big conspiracy — that he's responsible for, among other things, nerve-gas attacks that killed American citizens and the assassination of former President David Palmer.

There have been suggestions that Itzen is basing his character on current or former occupants of the White House, but he says that's not the case.

"The Nixon thing is just genetics," he said. "I have a receding hairline."

Actually, Itzin didn't know any more than the rest of us that Logan would turn out to be evil. He spent last season and most of this season trying to figure the guy out.

"When I was first approached about doing this, they (the producers) said, 'We're not sure where he's going. He has a hard time making a decision,' " Itzin said. "So they wrote it, and I gave them choices from semi-staunch leader of men to abject coward, and they always kept writing toward the abject coward."

As to any similarities to presidents living or dead, "I'm not modeling myself after anybody," Itzin said.

SINCE ABC LAST AIRED an episode of "Commander in Chief" — way back on Jan. 24 — the network has announced two different returns for the show and then changed its mind.

Here's the third announcement, which sounds at least a bit like a death knell — "Chief" will air Thursdays at 9 p.m. beginning April 13. That puts it up against CBS's big hit "Without a Trace" and NBC's still-potent "ER."

Sort of like Ross Perot running against Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush.

This is not what anybody expected when "Chief" debuted last fall, quickly becoming the highest-rated new drama on TV. But the original production team, working under creator/executive producer Rod Lurie, couldn't deliver the show on time, forcing ABC to replace him.

But even TV veteran Steven Bochco had a hard time getting up to speed on the show — ratings dropped for his episodes. Several Bochco-produced episodes remain on the shelf, and now he's been replaced by Dee Johnson, who worked under both Lurie and Bochco and is reportedly taking the show back in the direction of more personal stories.

Not that it much matters. It certainly looks like ABC is giving up on "Chief."

THE SALE OF KUWB has been finalized. KTVX-Ch. 4's parent company, Clear Channel Communications, has completed its purchase and will move Ch. 30's operations into Ch. 4's facilities.

Still pending is KUWB's affiliation with The CW network, which will rise out of the ashes of UPN and The WB in September. According to the folks at Clear Channel and CBS (which will operate the new network in partnership with Time-Warner), it's a done deal just waiting for all the paperwork to be finished.

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E-mail: pierce@desnews.com