Scarborough Fare: Whacks Imus & NewsBusters On Twitter

Get over it already, Scarborough. Hamlet Act II: The lady doth protest too much, me thinks.  His bizarre, obsessive, ego-driven tweets in response to Imus crowing about the death of Joe and Mika's WABC Radio show are treading on Keith Olbermann's toxic Twitter turf.

Let me reiterate what I posited the morning Imus went after Scarborough - and I didn't know about Imus's Scarborough smackdown.  Citadel - which owns WABC - was blindsided by satellite radio rivals Sirius/XM simulcasting MSNBC content on both Sirius and XM channels.  "Morning Joe" is nothing more than three hours of talk radio with pictures.  Why continue the terrestrial WABC Radio show and pay the duo big bucks when "Morning Joe" defects to the satellite radio competition now airing live the same show WABC is offering but earlier the same day and one hour longer?  What I don't get is why Citadel and WABC are party to concealing the show's cancellation with the laughable "on hiatus" to be "retooled and expanded."

Ergo the hasty yanking of the show by Citadel a few days after the "Morning Joe" Sirius/XM promos hit.  "Why Joe Scarborough & Mika Brzezinski's WABC Radio Show Is Dead.

I suspect the show was underperforming in all 22 markets, but I haven't been able to get my hot hands on the affiliate list or Arbitron numbers.  In April 2009 Scarborough's WABC show was added to Citadel's WMAL news/talk station and run live 10a-12noon, but later booted to tape delay 9p-12mid.  Now it's gone altogether.

Related:  Chickaboomer's "Quoth The Raven:  Nevermore"

Not Thinking While Driving

NBC's "Today" show hostess, the tart-tongued Meredith Viera, utters "oh shit" during a driving while texting simulation. Unlike MSNBC's Keith Olbermann who defiantly refused to bleep Dem Sen. Carl Levin's Goldman Sach's Senate hearing shit rant Tuesday, NBC is a broadcast television network regulated by the Federal Communications Commission and subject to massive fines for "fleeting profanities."

Jeff Zucker & the NBC Peter Principle

Ex-CNBCer now Fox biz's Charlie Gasparino gets his hot hands on a NBCU bond
prospectus outlining NBC's $223 mil loss on the Olympics and on Leno's switch, and rats on NBC and Jeff Zucker.

"The big winner, NBC president Jeff Zucker!"

Charlie: "According to this prospectus [$5 bil bond deal], ironically Goldman Sachs was the lead underwriter... if you start adding this up he [Zucker] could be making up to $23 million."

After they lost 34 percent? 

Zucker's base salary in his contract ending 2013 - $6.3 mil. Minimum  bonus $1.5 mil.  2 mil and 4.5 mil a performance bonus. He could get 200% of his salary under some other thing in his contract.

Watch Charlie's NBCU revelations here.

So Zucker is rewarded for losing?  I'm not getting it....  Whose dick is Zucker sucking?

The Huffington Post is reporting seriously that Zucker is considering a political career.  Zucker told the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz he'd probably get less media scrutiny running for offce than he gets running NBC. Au contraire, my political naif!

As a former campaign old hand, let me assure you that Zucker has zero chance of winning if he decides to run for bailing Dem Sen. Chris Dodd's Connecticut seat.... Jeff's ego's talking. Chutzpah to the max.

CNBC's Larry Kudlow has made noises about running as a Republican.  If both won their parties' nominations, wouldn't that be a fun face-off?  Zucker v Kudlow.

Quoth The Raven: Nevermore

Why did Citadel allow Joe Scarborough to conjure a legend about "retooling and revamping" his WABC Radio show to three hours to justify WABC's  jettisoning the show at the end of the first third of the Arbitron Spring book? (April/May/June 2010.)

Radio Equalizer's Brian Maloney: "All week, the biggest inside joke in broadcasting has been news of an "expanded" version of Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski's syndicated radio program coming just as the current one appears to have abruptly ended.

In Joe's swan song on his last day on WABC airwaves, he went on a bizarre rant attacking and mocking Glenn Beck, conservative talkers - and Don Imus who responded by crowing Joe's show is being "cancelled" not "expanded" which would bump the first hour of Rush Limbaugh on WABC.  Listen to Imus at the end of Maloney's video:



Related: Chickaboomer's "Why Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski's WABC Radio Show Is Dead" April 28

Al Peterson's NTS "Hell Hath No Fury Like An I-Man Scorned."

Cable News Ratingzzz

Wednesday April 28, 2010  ABC sends out a press release touting "Good Morning America" nipping at the "Today" show's heels.

Isn't that never to be seen again on NBC's "Today" - phantom correspondent Tiki Barber?  Looks like he pulled amazing ratings Thursday April 29, 2010.

No trace of Tiki's squeeze, former NBC intern Traci Lynn Johnson...

Circle Jerk

"Ms. Winfrey, who returned to North Carolina to interview Ms. Hunter in the house that Mr. Edwards provides, wasn’t confrontational or even very probing. (She reserves her prosecutorial wrath for guests who have crossed her."  Alessandra Stanley, NYT TV czarina, on Oprah's vacuous interview with the equally vacuous Rielle Hunter.

Oprah now turns her attention to distracted driving, devoting Friday's show to bitchslap cell phone and texting twits. Oprah appeared by telly on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" to pimp her latest quest - forcing all 50 states to adopt the Queen's ban on DWT.

"Morning Joe" co-host Mika Brzezinski had the last word: "We love you, Oprah!"

Not one peep about Kitty Kelley's unauthorized bio of the billionairess...  Cue "Morning Joe" music bed "Wil It Go Round In Circles?" - Billy Preston

Jism Schism

A New York TV anchoress thinks soy milk should be renamed "soy jism."  Yuck!  On WNYW's "Good Day New York." Just when New Yorkers were pouring milk into their cereal.



This is the same station where 10p anchor Ernie Anastos inexplicably advised "keep fucking that chicken."

Maybe there was a retrograde Mercury then, too...

Conan On NBC: Toxic

Conan's first TV interview since Jay Leno and NBC put the screws to him.  Conan tells "60 Minutes" Steve Kroft that he never would've done what Leno did to him.

Predict the ratings for Conan's "60 Minutes" appearance.  TVbytheNumbers Bill Gorman is going with a 2.6 18-49 adults.

As for Leno, he's pulling the same ratings as Conan and beating Letterman.

Curses! Foiled Again!

Our Snidely Whiplash Komrades at Media Matters muse Fox's Neil Cavuto's ignored anything substantive on financial reform this week and instead focused on what MM whines is Cavuto's obsession with Carl "Shitty" Levin. MM describes Cavuto's coverage as "a word that rhymes with pretty." Gritty?



I find Media Matters' obsession with Fox News fascinating.  How many hours do you suppose MM grunts spent timing two days of Cavuto?  Not to mention toiling over this handy graph. Rhymes with "pretty."  Pity.

What, Me Worry?"

What merger?  Fox and CBS suits (Moonves) take an Alfred E. Neumann stance on the Comcast/NBC Universal marriage.  THR

Caption This!

John Edwards baby mama Rielle Hunter on Wedneday's Oprah. Watch.

Have you heard the one about how Terry Bradshaw popped out of a cake on Jay Leno's 60th wearing nothing but boxers?

Nancy With The Air-Brushed Face

Katie Couric got her ass kicked by the vulture media for shedding 20 pounds via air brush in a CBS promo shot.  

So here's covergirl Nancy Pelosi dumping 20 years from her chronological age of 70 - not with plastic surgery - but with CBS's tool.

Chickaboomer hears enough air was expended to make Mars livable for humans...

Gasp!

It's Charlie Gasparino.  Then and Now.  What's with those Larry King suspenders?  Does Charlie look like the kind of guy who can "rip the lungs out of the competition?   Gasparino got his start at the Tampa Tribune in 1990 where 20 years later the Trib's Walt Belcher brands him "the most tenacious and pugnacious reporter coming Wall Street today."

Walt had me at the photo and I'm still stumped.  Is that really the same dude? 

CNN: For Whom The Bell Tolls

CNN co-founder Reese Schonfeld: CNN's team, Brown, King and Cooper, is, in the words of Frank Loesser, "either too young or too old ... too grey or too grassy green." One of them is long since his prime, and the others have no reason to be in prime at all.

I think CNN is at risk of becoming a bad joke. Late night comics and cartoonists are already using them as a gag line. Newspapers are asking "experts" how to save them. It's time for a major change, before moving from "joke" to "tired joke". Writing this is getting tired, too. It's making me feel cruel, and, even if April is the cruelest month, I'd rather be writing about something else.

CNN"s "American Morning" is tanking big time. 

TVbytheNumbers notes it was nearly a year ago when the show peaked with Michael Jackson's planetary exit.

Trump Taps "Today" Talent

NBC's "Today" show's Natalie Morales fronting Donald Trump's Miss USA pageant next month in Las Vegas. 

Shaken, Not Stirred

Mike Allen's POLITICO Playbook: Willie Geist read this statement on 'Morning Joe,' from Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski and Willie Geist: "Our friend Chris Licht [executive producer of 'Morning Joe'] was admitted to a Washington hospital yesterday after experiencing extreme head pain. A subsequent CT scan led doctors to believe that Chris had suffered an aneurysm. Chris is in stable condition and suffered no neurological effects from the incident. We expect him to make a full recovery. Please keep the Chris in your prayers."

Hope Chris is well enough to shepherd MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Morning After Sunday 8a show Live From The White House after Saturday's "Prom" - the WH Correspondents' dinner.  MSNBC is sparing no expense for the after-party. 

The aforementioned Mike Allen - so in the tank for MSNBC - marvels: MSNBC's 'THE AFTER PARTY' following Saturday's White House Correspondents' Association dinner will feature Rachel Maddow tending bar, mixing Vieux Carres, Primm's Cups, rum daiquiris. The bash at the Mellon Auditorium, the biggest venue ever for an after-party, is being masterminded by Philip Dufour. MSNBC will have oysters, sushi, burgers, fries, milkshakes -- and breakfast for those like Jim VandeHei who keep the party going until the wee hours. Also: a full-service Starbucks bar. Upstairs: a martini tasting bar and Make Your Own S'mores. Expect a big performance around 12:15 a.m., to be revealed in tomorrow's Playbook.

Who is Philip Dufour?  Lemme see. In the Clinton administration, he was social secretary to Al Gore.  Loves Michelle Obama and Joe Biden on his Facebook.  Is friends with Dem firebrand Donna Brazile...

Solid Goldman

The 11-hour Goldman Sachs Senate shit storm Tuesday beat CNN's Wolf Blitzer at 6p and Campbell Brown in total viewers prime time, and nearly caught John King USA and MSNBC's Chris Matthews.  TVbytheNumbers

5PM – P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
Glenn Beck – 2,343,000 viewers (645,000) (1,117,000)
Situation Room—617,000 viewers (183,000) (246,000)
Hardball w/ C. Matthews – 599,000 viewers (151,000) (238,000)
Goldman Hearings – 481,000 viewers (115,000) (173,000)
Showbiz Tonight —195,000 viewers (101,000) (102,000)

6PM – P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
Special Report w/ Bret Baier – 1,971,000 viewers (437,000) (808,000)
Situation Room—476,000 viewers (140,000) (187,000)
Ed Show —617,000 viewers (186,000) (272,000)
Goldman Hearings —532,000 viewers (135,000) (216,000)
Prime News – 282,000 viewers (167,000) (170,000)

7PM – P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
The Fox Report w/ Shep – 1,557,000 viewers (368,000) (665,000)
John King USA – 488,000 viewers (162,000) (231,000)
Hardball w/ C. Matthews – 708,000 viewers (237,000) (351,000)
Goldman Hearings – 431,000 viewers (120,000) (177,000)
Issues – 426,000 viewers (237,000) (296,000)

8PM – P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
The O’Reilly Factor – 2,359,000 viewers (619,000) (1,044,000)
Campbell Brown – 343,000 viewers (90,000) (127,000)
Countdown w/ K. Olbermann – 876,000 viewers (270,000) (468,000)132,000)
Goldman Hearings (8:30 – 9:00pm/et) – 371,000 viewers (109,000) (156,000)
Nancy Grace – 626,000 viewers (250,000) (359,000)

TIME Has Come Today

Fox's Glenn Beck makes TIME mag's annual "most influential" list out today.  Bill Clinton is #1 under "Heroes."

Sarah Palin - also on the list - wrote the Glenn Beck glowing graf.

"It's just TV."

Donny Deutsch at 30 Rock Tuesday - presumably the first time he'd set foot in the building since Keith Olbermann's explosion after Deutsch fingered him as one of media's angry mob - which included Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh.

Deutsch was yanked out of his fill-in MSNBC host gig on the second day by MSNBC president Phil Griffin.

Wednesday's ubiquitous headline:  "Donny Deutsch Has No Hard Feelings."

Do you believe that?  I don't... Donny's Olbermann hard-on has to be priapistic...

April Showers Fox With 100th #1 Month

More April cable news ratings and analysis from the bipartisan Huffington Post.

Betty White At 88 Is SNL's Oldest Host

SNL's Betty White promo for her May 8th hosting gig:

Keith Olbermann's Shit Floats To The Top

"Keith Olbermann is the 13 year-old boy of cable news."  Gawker blogger after Olbermann gleefully played Carl "Shitty" Levin's Goldman Sachs shit storm on Tuesday's MSNBC "Countdown."

Watch it here.

If Olbermann ran Levin's shit rant on NBC or any other FCC-regulated broadcast network, the network would be fined big time for airing "fleeting expletives."

Olbermann's in-your-face is professionally inappropriate, irresponsible, and is yet another exhibition of Olbermann's blatantly poor judgment and puerile ego.

Anyone else at MSNBC would be up shit creek without a paddle.  MSNBC boss Phil Griffin should suspend Olbermann for deliberately running expletives other MSNBC hosts have been disciplined for inadvertently uttering.  To wit:  "Morning Joe" got tape delay after Joe accidentally said "fuck" live in real time.

Even naughty potty mouth Jon Stewart bleeped out Levin on his Comedy Central "The Daily Show."  Watch here.

Playa Tiki's Backfield In Motion Tackles "Today" Gig

Tiki Barber - NBC "Today" show correspondent not seen on-air since January - is hit with pregnant-with-twins wife Ginny's divorce petition. Tiki's off-air adulterous affair with a former NBC intern reportedly has cost him his big bucks "Today" gig.

Conan Drops The Rock On "60 Minutes"

Conan O'Brien rocks on Sunday's "60 Minutes."  Under his $44 mil NBC exit deal Conan was barred from doing TV interviews until May 1.

Megyn Kelly: Sizzle AND Steak

How hot is Fox's Megyn Kelly?  She's so blistering hot that a Fox suit is comparing her to Barbara Walters.  Barbara's 80; Megyn's not even 40. The Daily Beast's Rebecca Dana (ex-WSJ editor and reporter) serves up The Compleat Megyn Kelly Profile.

Oh, and don't EVER send her flowers!

Maddow Mentor Olbermann Now Tormentor?

MSNBC's Rachel Maddow should check her pick-up truck brake lines.

Now that she's dogging Olbermann in the ratings the former Olbermann protege could find herself the target of Olbermann's paranoid wrath.

TVbytheNumbers graph.

CNBC In The Red

Street Insider "CNBC Is Bleeding Viewers": Investors seem to care less and less each month about what Cramer sees in the markets, as the last 12-months has seen his shows number of viewers drop 39 percent overall and 42 percent in the key age demographic according to Nielsen. The over-the-top investor-guru's show has seen its average monthly drop to a 0.1 percent share after holding a 0.2 percent share for the previous 15-months of the period examined.

As for "Street Signs," the key demographic has lost its way as the number of average viewers has slipped 56 percent and overall by 34 percent. Street Signs ratings have gone from a 0.4 percent share in the January 2009 to 0.2 percent in the current month.

The sharpest drop in the average number of viewers for CNBC has been seen in the last month, as the total is down 11 percent overall, lower by 12 percent for "Street Signs" and down 13 percent for "Mad Money."

Over at CNN biz reporter Ali Veshi is hemorrhaging viewers. 

MSNBC's Contessa Brewer: El Stupido

What part of "illegal" do MSNBC bonehead anchoress Contessa Brewer and MSNBC's Chyron operator not understand?   Chickaboomer hears Brewer also believes in crop circles...

Brewer speculates on "neighbors turning against neighbors" under the Arizona law.  Ya think?  Watch the video. I find it hard to believe illegals would turn in other illegals.

Why Joe Scarborough & Mika Brzezinski's WABC Radio Show Is Dead

"I do get the feeling that whatever happened, happened rather suddenly. And 22 affiliates isn't a very big base, even if one of them is WABC."  Radio bigwig on Citadel's announcement that Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski's WABC radio show is "on hiatus" and will be "expanded and retooled."

The pair were intriguingly off the air Monday with no warning.  So Chickaboomer consulted four top radio insiders well-regarded in the industry for their take.

"So this is a chance for consultants to flaunt a few buzz words and for the duo to do some major dog-and-pony practice runs for the new show. Basically, the premise is that if you gild it and polish it, a turd will pass for an ingot."  -Source #2

Me:  "There's more to this than meets the eye. This came out of left field."

Souce #3:  "I couldn't agree more.What's wrong with the radio trade press? They simply parrot back Citadel's release without asking the obvious?"

So did the clueless TV press. Brian Stelter NYT Media Decoder. TVNewser.  I wasn't buying the spin so I didn't post the Citadel press pimp.

"Hi Marty!  Spin? You think this is spin? from radio people...really? :) I think the show had  'challenging' ratings and affiliate clearances and everyone is stepping back to review and maybe re-tool.  My take is this is strictly a biz decision from a company that is re-organizing on numeous levels."  -Source #4 

Lost in translation: "revamp and retool" means Vanished Into Radio Etherland...

Here's what I think happened and it is pure speculation:   Citadel's terrestrial WABC was blindsided by MSNBC's simulcasting on both Sirius and XM satellite rivals and pulled the plug on Joe & Mika's show. In essence, "Morning Joe" is three hours of talk radio broadcast on MSNBC and now Sirius/XM from 6-9 a.m.  Convenient excuse to ditch the show with only 22 affiliates.

Larry's Lovely Bones

"Larry doesn't have a mean bone in his body. He is a wonderful man in every area of his life except marriage. He just doesn't have a moral compass when it comes to women." Julie Alexander, Larry King wife #6, on Larry's swinging marital life with wife Shawn. 

White House Press Pool Loses Thrill Up Legs

"Frankly, that's when he does the best work." MSNBC's "Morning Joe" co-host Mika Brzezinski (8:25a Wed.) on Obama's interview with Fox News' Bill O'Reilly and Bret Baier. The subject: how the press is souring on Obama's WH and press secretary Robert Gibbs and the Obama's New York Times "favoritism."

Regular "Morning Joe" talking head - POLITICO's Jim VandeHei - was on talking about "Why Reporters Are Down On Obama."

Letterman On Leno: "He got everything he deserved."

"There's also another side of him... He's just a complete boob. He can't help himself." David Letterman wishing Conan was still around to boost his sagging ratings now that Leno's whipping his ass:

"I've fallen and I can't get up!"

Estranged couple Larry and Shawn King suck it up for the cameras at a Little League game in Beverly Hills Saturday.

Radar Online has a video of a birthday party where Shawn's Little League loverboy Hector Penate pulls Larry off the grass when he can't get off his ass.

"One shitty deal."

Michigan Dem Sen. Carl Levin's expletives undeleted in making an ex-Goldman Sachs rich boy eat his words during Tuesday's Senate grilling.  NYDN names Levin's outburst "SHIT STORM" - quaintly leaving out the "i" - exploding eLevin times. 



POLITICO explores what triggered Levin's shit hitting the fan. As I wrote earlier today, this is just a dog and pony show for the media's benefit. Nothing's going to happen. An opportunity for preening, chest-beating, hypocritical, money-grubbing politicians.

Goldman was the second biggest donor to Obama's 2008 presidential campaign - to the tune of nearly a million bucks.

NYDN must-read here.

Ticket To Ride

Former MLB turned Dallas “SportsRadio 1310 The Ticket” KTCK host Mike Bacsik fired for this.  Radio-Info has more.

Could Sirius/XM Be Gone In Three Years?

Al Peterson's News/Talk/Sports

Goldman Fleece

Jay Leno: "The head of Goldman Sachs was going through security and was asked to empty his pockets - and five Republican senators fell out."

Leno failed to finger the ex-Goldman Sachs rich dudes Obama appointed to his economic advisory board - not to mention other ex-Wall Streeters in Obama's administration.  If Republicans were in Lloyd "I'm doing God's work" Blankfein's pocket, then the others were jockeying for influence in Obama's jockey shorts.

All you need to know about mortgage credit-default swaps is from this man:  Michael Burry.

Burry started buying up what's now known as credit-default swaps in 2005.  Burry was betting that those sub-prime mortgages awarded to suckers who couldn't pay them back would pay off for him.

Back then when Burry contacted the giants on Wall Street, nobody even got what he was talking about.  But he piqued the interest of... Goldman Sachs. Burry made a fortune buying what amounted to insurance on bad mortgages that would go belly up in three years.  So did Goldman.  Goldman got into the game when they realized what Burry was doing and how much dough was to be made. Read on.

So fast-forward to April 2010 with Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein and cohorts fielding a dog and pony grilling by a Senate committee....

Ted Turner Forgot To Take His Lithium Before Going On Fox Business Network

H/t Steve Krakauer Mediaite

Leaving for Chickaboomer's Southern Command in Witness Protection Program Land.  Will return Tuesday!

Ex-WSJ Reporter: "The Times is a cork bobbing in a pretty big ocean."

Rupert Murdoch's Wall Street Journal debuts the paper's new metro section Monday giving the New York Times some much-needed competition.

But the Times isn't taking it lightly, although you wouldn't know it by the smartass end to publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr.'s internal memo leaked to Huff Post's Danny Shea:

As our welcome gift to New York, we pass on a few helpful hints to our Journal colleagues: the Dodgers now play in Los Angeles, Soho is the acronym for South of Houston, Fashion Week has moved to Lincoln Center, Idlewild is now JFK and Cats is no longer playing on Broadway. If you happen to know anyone who works for the Journal's new section and he or she wants any additional information about the greater New York region, tell them to check out NYTimes.com's always very helpful archive.

The memo also mocked WSJ corporate cousin Fox News, stating its "position of strength in the New York marketplace" by citing what it described as "a series of numbers that, to borrow a phrase often misused, are 'fair and balanced.'"

Extra!  Extra! Read all about it here in the Huffington Post.

Holding Court

Fox News' Courtney Friel dons a tiara and summons a red carpet for her 30th birthday bash over the weekend.  Courtney on Facebook announcing the "Red Carpet Arrivals": "I love red carpets so much I had to make my OWN step and repeat! I got it done at RedCarpetRunway.com. Your guests will LOVE it!  You can get the cake plus picture for 50$ at Food Emporium here in Manhattan."

What? No Greg Gutfeld sighting?   The star red carpet walkers:  Fox's Rick Leventhal, Rick Reichmuth, Jill Dobson, reporter Laura Ingle.

Chickaboomer's exercising rare restraint....

Update:  TVNewser posted a video of some chick taking a tour of "beauty queen" Courtney Friel's "life-changing" (repeat twice), "amazing" (repeat 10 times) "dream closet."  "First of all I have a tiara on because it's my 30th birthday and I'm allowed to wear one."

 

From Naughty Monkeys To Manolos, Sarah Palin's Gold Rush Pays Off

Gabriel Sherman's NY mag cover story: Palin is a singular national industry. She didn’t invent her new role out of whole cloth. Other politicians have cashed out, used the revolving door, doing well in business after doing good in public service. Entertainment figures like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jesse Ventura, and even Ronald Reagan have worked the opposite angle, leveraging their celebrity to make their way in politics. And family dramas have been a staple of politics from the Kennedys—or the Tudors—on down. But no one else has rolled politics and entertainment into the same scintillating, infuriating, spectacularly lucrative package the way Palin has or marketed herself over multiple platforms with the sophistication and sheer ambitiousness that Palin has shown, all while maintaining a viable presence as a prospective presidential candidate in 2012.

The numbers are staggering. Over the past year, Palin has amassed a $12 million fortune and shows no sign of slowing down. Her memoir has so far sold more than 2.2 million copies, and Palin is planning a second book with HarperCollins. This January, she signed a three-year contributor deal with Fox News worth $1 million a year, according to people familiar with the deal. In March, Palin and Burnett sold her cable show to TLC for a reported $1 million per episode, of which Palin is said to take in about $250,000 for each of the eight installments.

Prom Night

Can't wait for MSNBC's "Morning Joe" special edition Sunday 8am Monday morning quarterbacking the Saturday "Prom" - the White House Correspondents' Dinner emceed by Jay Leno.  Promos for the "special" popped up this a.m. pimping LIVE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE!

It'll be a one-week drunk and starfuck for some, with parties starting early in the week.  Witness the weird couplings like 2009's dinner with guest Colin Powell chatting up booby blonde Jenny McCarthy.

How did this formerly staid event become such a hot ticket?  Blame Fawn Hall and the late Michael Kelly who invited her in 1987.

Related:  Chickaboomer's "Press Guest Zero: Fawn Hall" May 2, 2009

The Decider

Former President George Bush's book "Decision Points" comes out November 9th. 35 bucks; $350 if you want the the signed and numbered cloth cover.

The liberal nattering nabobs of negativism wasted no time burning Bush.  NY mag mused the book was "memoir-ish" and should've been titled "Strategery."

WH Press Corps. v Robert Gibbs: May The Whores Be With You

Howard Kurtz Media Notes" on Sunday's CNN "Reliable Sources" interview with Obama press czar Robert Gibbs':

Gibbs: "The truth is what makes really good television are not two people that are at the end of a four- or five-minute segment going to come to an agreement. But at the end of the four- or five-minute segment are, you know, maybe 30 seconds away from doing each other bodily harm."

Kurtz: What about Obama calling out Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh by name? Gibbs denied that the president was boosting their stature and tried to cast it as a matter of accountability: "The media in some cases covers the food fight, but doesn't necessarily check who started it and whether they started it for a reason that was legitimate or not."

Christiane Amanpour's Performance-enhancing Plugs

Why George Stephanopoulous's ABC This Week successor Christiane Amanpour will scare the bejeezus out of guests.  She possesses a special talent:  the ability to stare down an unblinking woman surrounded by eight naked people.  Who leaked this BS to Page Six?  And why did they run it?
Related:  Performance artist Marina Abramovic at MoMA.

Take that, bitch!

Chickaboomer already told you last week that Maria Bartiromo's CNBC rival - the younger and prettier Erin Burnett -- was MIA at Maria's book party. Monday's  NYP Page Six: Could things still be frosty between CNBC queens Maria Bartiromo and Erin Burnett? Burnett was a noticeable no-show at the party for Bartiromo's book, "The 10 Laws of Enduring Success," at the Empire Hotel the other night. At the bash were a host of Bartiromo's CNBC colleagues including Trish Regan, Scott Wapner, Michelle Caruso-Cabrera and Bob Pisani, as well at NBC chief Jeff Zucker. Both have denied a rivalry, with Bartiromo saying a few years back, "Erin and I are friends." A CNBC rep declined to comment, but sources tell us Burnett had a 6 a.m. start at the New York Stock Exchange the following morning.

Sure.