Broadcasters Try Putting a New Spin on Auld Lang Syne: “Around Times Square on Saturday night, as the sky was filled with a blizzard of confetti and the hour approached midnight, a handful of television personalities including Ryan Seacrest, Regis Philbin, Carson Daly and Stuart Scott were jockeying to become the next king of New Year’s Eve, the next Dick Clark.

But as it approached time for Mr. Clark to make his appearance at 11:35 on his annual “New Year’s Rockin’ Eve” show, more than a year after a stroke forced him to miss last year’s broadcast, another question waited to be answered: would Dick Clark be Dick Clark, the symbol of youthfulness and constancy on television for nearly a half-century?

Mr. Clark, 76, had made no public appearances since his stroke, and in the weeks leading up to the show there had been wide, sometimes grotesque speculation in the news media about whether Mr. Clark would be fit to be on the show.&rdquo (New York Times )