We asked State Department veteran Tara Sonenshine to watch the premiere episode of the series, which centers on an unconventional secretary of state, a former CIA analyst played by Tea Leoni, with us to see how accurately the show gets Washington and the world of Foggy Bottom diplomacy.

One of this fall’s newest political TV shows trades in the drama of an Oval Office affair for foreign affairs — and PTA meetings too. Adding to the growing line up of political programs, CBS will premiere “Madam Secretary,” on Sunday, Sept. 21, at 8 p.m. EST. The show, with executive producers Lori McCreary and Morgan Freeman, stars Tea Leoni as Elizabeth McCord — a former CIA analyst who is suddenly asked to leave her life in academia behind to take the reins at the State Department.

The sudden blackout of popular U.S. shows is seen as an example of Chinese leaders keeping a tight grip on foreign media to counter the U.S.'s soft power and shore up China's own television industry. Last year, Chinese censors withheld box office receipts while negotiating a rise in tariffs on Western importers. Now, Chinese leaders want to become not only international exporters of finished goods but also dramas and soap operas...

The crowd of roughly 10,000 fans cheered, and the lights glowed electric blue as a woman in a bright white gown introduced the next act in the giant auditorium here. “Please give it up now for Albania!” she shouted.

Many Chinese fans of American television are feeling aggrieved. They cannot understand why their government is robbing them of even the small pleasures in life. Earlier this month, four US shows - The Big Bang Theory,The Good Wife, NCIS and The Practice - were removed from Chinese internet streaming sites on the censors' order. No reason was given.

Qatar is launching a new television station as a political counterweight to Al Jazeera amid concern the network has become too supportive of the Muslim Brotherhood. The new station is to be an Arabic-language news channel based in London and broadcasting across the Arab world.

Korean pop, which is radically increasing in global popularity, is setting the tone for the nation's mourning by going absolutely silent. Billboard reported this week that K-pop charts have come to a standstill, as music and TV programming have halted as well. This is unprecedented.

Mainland censors must have no clue about what they are censoring. They probably received instructions from higher-ups that some popular foreign TV series being shown online must be shut down as part of an internet campaign to clean up pornography and other undesirable contents. So to meet quotas, they randomly picked a few.