Check. Mark.

TIME mag's Mark Halperin is officially on MSNBC's payroll. Good for him since he's a frequent face on 'Morning Joe." Here he is announcing his new gig Wednesday:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Halperin will be MSNBC's 'senior political analyst' - essentially the same title he has at TIME where he'll continue his blog 'The Page.'

Amusing that among 'Morning Joe's' stable of paid talking heads is Donny Deutsch and now Mark Halperin.  The duo of Deutsch Mark . . .

Midnight At The Oasis

Send your camel to bed . . . I'll be your belly dancer, prancer, and you can be my sheik. Maria Muldaur 1974.

So NYTimes columnist Maureen Dowd (with camel), fifyish, never married, luckless with American men, travels to Saudi Arabia.

Here she is, right, auditioning for Sheik ur Buty's harem. Alas, she didn't find a husband in her travels for Vanity Fair.

But I found a chance to revisit Maria's hit song:



Do you remember where you were (if you're old enough) in 1974 when this song was hotter than the Sahara desert?  I was at WJBK TV (then a CBS affiliate, now Fox) in Detroit.

Why Is This Woman Smiling?

Tiger Woods and estranged wife Elin have agreed to an unprecedented $750 mil divorce settlement.  Elin gets the dough but has to keep her yap shut.  It's clear Elin's got all the cards and has won tight restrictions on Tiger's chicks around their two children.

After cranking out the hits Wed. a.m., I've taken off my Chickaboomer Hermes babushka, FedExed it to Nancy Pelosi, and donned my Perry Mason black fedora.  Am working on my questions for my daughter and son-in-law's breach-of-contract house lease case hearing Thursday 2p in Berkeley County (SC) Circuit Court.

The Born Identity

Wednesday update: The Eleventh Man arrested in Cyprus Tuesday was (incredibly) allowed bail pending an extradition hearing and Wednesday he checked out.  The court let him out on more than $32,000 bail if he agreed to daily check-ins at the police station.

Red-headed Red Anna (Anya Kuschenko) Chapman outside NBC's Rockefeller Center in NYC. The 28-year-old hottie lived the high life in Manhattan for two years before it all came crashing down last weekend.

The FBI claims, among other things, the 11-member ring was encrypting messages on certain Internet websites.

Wednesday Pravda ('truth' in Russian) called the spy scandal 'a mountain in a molehill.'

The New York Times misses the point by mminimizing the intelligence the 11-member U.S. embedded spy ring got. The point is they successfully passed themselves off as Americans with phony names and fake histories to assimilate into American society. And it appears they succeeded in fooling neighbors, friends, and professional colleagues.

These spies - known as 'illegals' because they don't have diplomatic cover - are a staple of Russian intelligence operations.,

Memo to the Washington Post:  It's 'Moscow Centre' not 'Center.' Same to the NYP. There's no more KGB.  SVR is equivalent to America's CIA and the Brits MI5.  The Russian counterpart to the FBI is the FSB.

NYP's TV maven Linda Stasi suggests TV networks snap up the spies to star in a reality TV series by setting up a 'work-release program' after they serve their relatively short jail time.  Stasi's funniest series title:  'Brighton Bitches." (NY's Brighton Beach is teeming with Russians.)

If NBC's Bravo can make stars and big time dough for the bumbling yet successful penetrators of a Obama White House state dinner, why not another Bravo franchise? "Real Spies.'  Name your city.

Chickaboomer's book club highly recommends 'The Defence of the Realm' by Christopher Andrew - the authorized history of MI5 - the FBI's Brit counterpart agency.

Anderson Next To Fly CNN's Coop?

CNN's leaking like the BP gusher.  Anonymous grudge-bearing CNNers pissed at Anderson Cooper's preferential treatment by suits are getting out the word that Cooper is next to bail.

These sources don't get how Anderson gets the resources to camp out on location in the Gulf when his ratings suck big time.

Dylan Ratigan: Smug Rat

Who needs a crystal ball to devine that MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan is floating his own name as a cure to Keith Olbermann's plunging ratings and 'tired shtick?' 

I defy you read this on Jason Raznicks Benzinga and not conclude Ratigan is the rat cooking Olbermann's goose.

Or to invoke the hackneyed phrase of the moment:  throwing Olbermann under the bus . . .

CNN Allows Larry King To Save Face

CNN president Jon Klein:  Larry is ending his show after 25 years at CNN 'on his own terms.'  NYTimes Brian Stelter

'Larry is a beloved member of the CNN family,' Klein wrote in a memo to CNN staff.

Larry. 76, announced his retirement Tuesday night right out of the gate. He told guest Bill Maher he went to CNN with his retirement offer and CNN 'graciously accepted.'

'I never felt any pressure.  CNN never pressured me.' Howard Kurtz Washington Post 

But Larry couldn't help but see the handwriting on the wall with falling ratings and leaked rumors of his potential successors including Katie Couric (who reportedly turned down the gig) and Brit Piers Morgan (CNN denied the rumors).

Larry's choice to replace him?  Ryan Secrest  'if he has a great interest in politics. I’m sure there’s a ton of people that could do it. Come on, it’s Q.&A.'

The reigning King of the Night started his radio broadcasting career more than 50 years ago in Miami.  He'll stay at CNN doing 'periodic specials.'

But an incredibly reliable source tells Chickaboomer [ 'periodic specials'] '"s code they don't want him on the air anymore. He says it was his decision, which is code for they don't want me on the air anymore. I think the tabloid crap plus the lousy guests and stupid topics forced CNN to do it. The thing is, goofy as the show is, it still made money."

King (born Larry Zeiger in Brooklyn) made his mark hosting an all-night radio talk show on Mutual Broadcasting radio network starting in 1978.  It was five hours long.  In 1979 I was named Larry's overnight news anchor. 

The face people thought was only for radio made his TV debut at Washington's WJLA TV where his then-wife (or ex-wife, I can't keep them all straight) Sharon King was the producer.  The show gave Larry an opportunity to acquire TV sea legs.  Larry actually interviewed me on that show in early 1985.  Larry jumped to CNN that same year.

It wasn't until the 1992 presidential election that Larry King's star shot through the media and political stratosphere.  Ross 'I'm all ears' Perot appeared on Larry's show and other presidential candidates followed suit, changing the landscape of political campaigns. At the time a sincereLarry told me he was puzzled but pleased with his newfound fame.

In the early 1990s I did a TV interview with Larry at Mutual's studios in Arlington, Virginia.  Unlike yours truly who doesn't give a rat's ass what people think of me, Larry had a burning desire to be liked.  '"I want to be liked," he emphasized.

Related:  Larry's career in photos

Larry King: "It's time to hang up my nightly suspenders."

Larry King shocker!  He kicked off the first couple minutes of Tuesday night's show by announcing he's retiring.  This fall.  His contract was to expire May 2011.



Larry's 2010 second quarter 25-54 ratings were the worst ever.

Fox News Humps. Olbermann Jumps?

No contest. Fox News on top in second quarter ratings. #3 in All Of Cable behind the Usual Suspects:  USA and TNT.

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann's 'Countdown' is down for the count in 25-54. But an MSNBC spox who'd taken a few 'Mother's Little Helpers' after the numbers came out told Business Insider's Joe Pompeo: 'Countdown' is the highest rated show on MSNBC, and we're thrilled with its performance.'

Jump!  Pul-eeze!

Pompeo has all the poop here.  MSNBC eats the numbers and vomits this press release on all its primetime show.

Larry King's CNN show had the worst 25-54 quarter ever.  John King - who took Lou Dobbs's 7p slot - had the most ratings sucko show on CNN.

CNN's hopes ride on Eliot Spitzer & Kathleen Parker -- the 'Double Stuf' creamy filling in the Double King Oreo.

Never one to pass up an opportunity to slide into a custom Armani super tight tee shirt, stud Anderson Cooper's ratings since he's been strutting his stuff on location in the Gulf are sinking faster than Tony Hayward's reputation. (Right, Cooper in Haiti)

But a CNN press release finds the pony under a pile of gooey tarballs.

Meanwhile traditional broadcast TV networks viewers are bailing.

Lara's Wrong (?)

Rolling Stones reporter Matt Taibbi dumps on CBS News' Lara Logan for loftily claiming that there had to be 'ground rules' for the now-infamous Rolling Stone piece that brought down Stanley McChrystal.

Taibbi in 'Lara Logan, You Suck' Here's CBS's chief foreign correspondent saying out loud on TV that when the man running a war that's killing thousands of young men and women every year steps on his own dick in front of a journalist, that journalist is supposed to eat the story so as not to embarrass the flag.

Huffington Post's Danny Shea has more of Lara's comments on CNN's 'Reliable Sources' that set off Taibbi. 

Remember, Lara met and married then-married American 'contractor' Joe Burkett whom she snatched met while covering the Iraq war or whatever over there in the Middle East.  Lara's pregnant with her second child. Rather than blame CBS like Taibbi, it's more likely Lara's gone soft since hooking up with Burkett. Joe had her when he started humming 'Lara's Song' (Somewhere My Love) from 'Dr. Zhivago' as he kicked the ass of Lara's then-boyfriend, CNN's Michael Ware, in a CIA safe house.

Will Weigel Attract Conservative Viewers To MSNBC?

It didn't take fired conservative Washington Post blogger Dave Weigel long to find a soft landing.  He's MSNBC's #2 conservative hired gun (if you count Joe Scarborough).  Huff Post

He made his virgin MSNBC appearance on Keith Olbermann's Monday 'Countdown' with Keith trumpeting the news of Weigel's new gig:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

O'Reilly to Bolling: Tie One On

Last week FBN's new show 'Money Rocks' host Eric Bolling paid the obligatory debut week visit to the Big Guy: Bill O'Reilly.

O'Reilly advised Bolling women are into men's neckties. Bolling did not take Bill's advice. Perhaps, unlike Bill's experience, chick viewers only care about Eric above the neck and below the waist . . . Kate O'Hare's Hot Cuppa TV

Glenn Beck: The New Oprah?

Glenn Beck is doing for the book publishing industry what Oprah did:  sell books.  Daily Finance

Dem Media: The Elephant in the Room

Former 'NBC Nightly News' anchorman Tom Brokaw - still a presence on NBC and MSNBC (he was on 'Morning Joe' Tuesday a.m.), hit the daily double, appearing on NBC's 'Today' show Tuesday.  Brokaw admitted he's a Democrat in an interview with Matt Lauer. H/t Hot Air

Ho-hum . . .

CNN's Ed Henry: A Hunka Hunka Burnin' Love!

Elvis is in the building at CNN WH correspondent Ed Henry's weekend Las Vegas wedding to Shirley Hung.  TVNewser

Check out the wedding cake:

Ed insisted a piece of the Lincoln Bedroom . . .

Quoth The Raven: 'Nevermore.'

If you're simply yearning for more Michaele and Tareq Salahi, Carol Joynt does a five-part interview with the White House state dinner interlopers. Watch here.

No, it didn't run on NBC's 'Today' show or Katie Couric.

H/t Jim Bohannon

Tongue and Bleak

CNN's 'John King USA' snares a grim 353,000 total viewers at 7p Friday June 25 while MSNBC's 'Countdown with Keith Olbermann' falls below 1 mil. See all June 25 cable news ratings at TVbytheNumbers.

'Crazed Sex Poodle'

"All these years, Tipper Gore has been pushing for explicit sexual warnings and now we learn there should have been one on Al." Former Fox News entertainment reporter Bill McCuddy as quoted in Page Six.

(Photo, right, JammieWearingFool)

TV cameras were banned at a Gore speech Monday in San Diego.

Spies Like Us

Those of a Certain Age will remembere the 23-year-old movie 'No Way Out' starring Kevin Costner as a hero Navy Lt. Commander who is plucked for a plum job in the Pentagon as an assistant to the SECDEF.

Trouble is, Lt. Commander Tom Farrell is really a Russian spy sent to the U.S. as a young boy with a fake name and 'legend' to pass as an American.

Things go sour for Tom when he finds out he's screwing the same babe as the secretary of defense played superbly by Gene Hackman.  Hackman, in a rage, kills the girl.  His scumbag right hand man concocts a plot to divert attention from Hackman's involvement by inventing a phony 'mole' inside the Pentagon.  But neither Hackman nor the scumbag aide know there really IS a Russian mole in DOD.

The 1987 movie (with an uncredited Brad Pitt) made Costner a star, and featured former Senator Fred Dalton Thompson as DCI (before he entered politics for real).

Here's the scene where Costner is finally fingered and is trying to escape the dragnet. Tom/Yuri escapes, but his long-developed American identity is busted:



Far-fetched? Nyet. The FBI concluded a 10-year-investigation into 'illegal' agents by arrested 11 Russian spies who had lived normal lives in various U.S. cities as 'Americans.'

The FBI, with undercover agents posing as Russian agents, brought the whole operation down over the weekend.

They weren't arrested for spying.  Rather as acting as agents for a foreign government. The Smoking Gun has the court docs of the charges.  Read Cryptome's pdf docs.
One of the 11, hot busty babe 'Anna Chapman' (both pix) was ensconced in posh Manhattan digs claiming to be a real estate agent.  Perhaps 'Anna' is now lamenting, I'd rather be dead than red in the head. 

Anna is now the face of this spy scandal. NYDN  The next face of Estee Lauder.  Check out her real first name and Facebook. And ooh-la-la photos . . .

'Brush pass' and other tradecraft are sure to become a household phrases . . .

Here's how Itar-Tass spun the story (one 'spy' is still at large).

As for Pravda ('truth' in Russian), the paper claims the scandal orchestrated by Democrats targeted Obama, and not Russia:

Yevgeny Minchenko, the director of the International Institute of Political Expertise, described all that as a “delirious story”. It does not look like a spy scandal at all, he added.

“It’s a mess. Collecting political information, money laundering…They have charged the detainees with participating in political processes and attempts to exert influence on them. Any Western scientist of politics, who visits Russia, can be charged with the same things.

“They also said that the spies used Morse alphabet and encoded messages to transmit secret information. This is a joke if only we try to imagine what technologies intelligence services use nowadays. Does the USA really think that Russian special services are so outdated?

“Most likely, this scandal was masterminded inside the USA and does not have any Russian trace in it whatsoever. I have three versions to explain why they decided to do it. It can be a part of the campaign to promote US special services that would like to obtain more funding for their work. A group of the US establishment tries to sabotage the reset of relations between the USA and Russia. The scandal could be organized by Democrats as a tool to put pressure on Russia in the future.

Pravda insists the spy scandal was of U.S. 'design,' minimizing the light sentences compared with the ancient American Julius and Ethel Rosenberg spy case where the married pair of Russian agents were electrocuted in the 1950s. 

Pravda's best spin:  US media outlets said that the group was arrested after one of its members had been caught in a provocation organized by the FBI. A supposed spy accepted an envelope with $5,000 from a person who identified himself as a Russian communication agent. This seems to be very strange too. If the network had been working for years why would they accept cash from a complete stranger?

Ask the high-priced hookers who serviced Eliot Spitzer . . .

ABC's 'GMA' host George Stephanopoulos explains why he decided to lead with spies v BP gulf:

The spy ring bust came a couple of days after Obama and Russian President Dimitriy Medvedev enjoyed burgers at Obama's favorite Arlington, VA joint, Ray's Hell Burger during Medvedev's June 24th WH visit.

An Impressed CNN Hired Eliot Spitzer After MSNBC Found No Hole For Client Number Nine

CNN president Jon Klein tells CNN's Howard Kurtz on Sunday's 'Reliable Sources' why hooker-loving ex-NY Governor Eliot Spitzer is a fit host. To his credit, Howard doesn't make it a cakewalk for Klein.

• 'This is a person who has a voice who ought to be heard.'
• 'At the end of the day when people actually tune into the show, they're going to be glad that he is on.'

We'll see . . .



H/t Ed Morrissey Hot Air

Dylan Ratigan: 'Tankster'

Bill Gorman TVbytheNumbers: Not one, but two pieces in the New York Times today about Dylan Ratigan’s transformation from CNBC stock picker to MSNBC (primarily anti-bank) crusader. Unfortunately, he’s transformed MSNBC’s ratings downward.

NYT Brian Stelter: On most cable newscasts, the people who are writing new financial regulations are called congressmen. But on “The Dylan Ratigan Show” on MSNBC, some are called “banksters.” That term, a twist on gangsters ...  

Yeah, I'm smarter than a 5th grader and figured out the 'gangster' thing myself, Brian. But if you check out Dylan's ratings after a year on MSNBC, on Chickaboomer Dylan's called a 'tankster.'

Brian notes that the NBC-owned CNBC 'is sometimes mistaken for the captain of the stock market cheering squad.'

How's Dylan's anti-bank, anti-Wall Street play-acting going to play with MSNBC advertisers?

“Dylan wants to change the world. He’s a crusader.”  MSNBC czar Phil Griffin to pimp reporter Stelter, adding:

There are early signs that viewers are responding favorably to Mr. Ratigan. His show, which is on at 4 p.m. on weekdays, had an average of 330,000 viewers each afternoon in May, up 20 percent from the straightforward newscast that ran on MSNBC in that time slot last year — yet another viewer vote for opinion over old-fashioned news.

But in the battle for second place behind Fox News, MSNBC still loses to CNN in the daytime — including Mr. Ratigan’s hour — even though it wins at night . . . At MSNBC, Mr. Ratigan was initially given a midmorning time slot, but he made no dent in the ratings. Mr. Griffin concluded that “he plays better in the afternoon,” closer to the channel’s evening lineup of point-of-view hosts like Chris Matthews and Ed Schultz.

What has changed, perhaps, is that, while an anchorman like Mr. Dobbs fought to express his opinions on CNN, Mr. Ratigan is being emboldened by his bosses. Mr. Griffin likened Mr. Ratigan to a “wild mustang,” and said, “I don’t want to change him. I want to tame him a little bit,” so that the audience can keep up.

His advice to Mr. Ratigan: “If you want to create a movement, take it a little slower.

TVbytheNumbers Gorman reports, indeed, ex-CNBCer Dylan is taking it waaaay slow building up a following : His Dylan Ratigan Show (4pm Eastern, weekdays) launched on January 11, 2010, replacing MSNBC Live in that time period.

Dates Program Avg. Viewers (000s) Adults 25-54 (000s) Since then, vs. the same time period in 2009, the Dylan Ratigan Show has lost 12% of MSNBC Live’s average viewership and 21% of its cable news advertiser target adults 25-54 audience.

01/11/10-06/24/10 DYLAN RATIGAN SHOW 325 83

01/12/09-06/25/09 MSNBC LIVE 371 105

Change -12% -21%

Who’s [sic]  money is Dylan pouring out of a bucket?

Bill's referring to this NYTimes photo that accompanied Stelter's piece.

Maybe it's all the dough MSNBC's lost in advertising.

Bill's not the only one puzzled over the NYTimes Stelter piece.
BusinessInsider's 'The Wire' Joe Pompeo bends it like Bill.

Ratigan, an obvious over-indulger of Russian vodka, is 'transforming' himself into a 'Howard Beale' huckster.

MSNBC's theatrical primetime lineup is hosted by pitchmen on the level of the late Billy Mays.  Sham. Wow!  NYTimes fails to issue the disclaimer:  NYT has a 'content-sharing agreement' with MSNBC, CNBC, NBC et al.

I'd rather have my fingernails extracted with pliers than endure the torture of Dylan Ratigan's 4p three-ring circus.

To quote circus master showman P.T. Barnum:  'There's a sucker born every minute' - but I -- and thousands of others -- am not one of them.

Guns n' Poseurs

In a case brought by a DC gun owner, the Supreme Court predictably splits 5-4 in a victory for gun nuts like me.  The court also revisited a similar restrictive Chicago city law. 

Related:  NYT:  'Supreme Court Rules Gun Rights Apply To Local Gun Laws.'

So don't mess with me and my Taurus .38 resting comfortably in the console of my Mercedes Benz . . .

Around The World with Schlub Howard Kurtz

There he goes again.  Wash Post media maven and CNN 'Reliable Sources' host Howard Kurtz inserting appearance and wardrobe observations about yet another TV anchoress.  When last we visited Howard he was salivating over NBC News WH correspondent and MSNBC anchoress Savannah Guthrie's 'knee-high' boots.  You just knew he wanted to lick them.

Now he's turned his sexist eye on ABC 'World News' anchor Diane Sawyer:  'This is the non-glamorous side of Sawyer, who at the moment -- with her untamed hair, pale skin, black-rimmed glasses and plain white shirt -- looks like a 64-year-old housewife in need of a cup of coffee . . . The anchor disappears into her office for 15 minutes and reemerges as the Diane Sawyer you see on the screen: perfectly coiffed blond hair, powdered pink face, smart blue blouse.

Howard is in need of a good lay, I think, given his now-deleted Facebook chats with yours truly. 

'Brian Williams, who at the moment -- with his untamed hair, pale skin, black-rimmed glasses and plain white shirt -- looks like a 51-year-old volunteer fireman in need of a hose.'

Katie Bye? Curious

NYP reports Katie Couric turns up her perky nose at Larry King's CNN gig.  The media speculated Katie might replace Larry, but as it turns out, she's hammering out a new CBS News contract.  Will she stay on the the 'CBS Evening News?' 

Will Brit Piers Morgan replace Larry?  Will CNN put Larry on 'part-time' like the Post says.  She could do a deal that allows her to appear on CBS AND CNN like Anderson Cooper.

RE:  'John & Kate at 8' or 'Porker & Parker' - whichever you prefer, Katie told Page six she'll be 'curious' to see how this pairing shakes out.

Am in Charleston, SC playing Perry Mason in my daughter and son-in-law's breach of contract civil suit against the renters from hell who trashed their brand new house and bolted four months into a two-year lease.  The lawyer wanted a $3,500 retainer to be replenished when half was gone.  Vulture! Will be back on Chickaboomer later today.  By the way, CB has just logged post number 9,000 as of Sunday! 

How A Freelance Journo Made Fools Out Of Media Mavens

In 'The 36 Hours That Shook Washington' NYT columnist Frank Rich fingers the smug, elitist, know-it-all ass-kissing national media more concerned with crawling up the colons of sources than investigating the players and U.S. Afghan war strategy.

'...an impressive feat of journalism by a Washington outsider who seemed to know more about what was going on in Washington than most insiders did; 2) Obama’s failure to fire McChrystal months ago for both his arrogance and incompetence was a grievous mistake that illuminates a wider management shortfall at the White House; 3) The present strategy has produced no progress in this nearly nine-year-old war, even as the monthly coalition body count has just reached a new high.

There were few laughs in the 36 hours of tumult, but Jon Stewart captured them with a montage of cable-news talking heads expressing repeated shock that an interloper from a rock ’n’ roll magazine could gain access to the war command and induce it to speak with self-immolating candor. Politico theorized that Hastings had pulled off his impertinent coup because he was a freelance journalist rather than a beat reporter, and so could risk “burning bridges by publishing many of McChrystal’s remarks.”

That sentence was edited out of the article — in a routine updating, said Politico — after the blogger Andrew Sullivan highlighted it as a devastating indictment of a Washington media elite too cozy with and protective of its sources to report the unvarnished news. In any event, Politico had the big picture right. It’s the Hastings-esque outsiders with no fear of burning bridges who have often uncovered the epochal stories missed by those with high-level access. Woodward and Bernstein were young local reporters, nowhere near the White House beat, when they cracked Watergate. Seymour Hersh was a freelancer when he broke My Lai. It was uncelebrated reporters in Knight Ridder’s Washington bureau, not journalistic stars courted by Scooter and Wolfowitz, who mined low-level agency hands to challenge the “slam-dunk” W.M.D. intelligence in the run-up to Iraq.

Symbolically enough, Hastings was reporting his McChrystal story abroad just as Beltway media heavies and their most bold-faced subjects were dressing up for the annual White House correspondents’ dinner. Rolling Stone has never bought a table or thrown an afterparty for that bacchanal, and it has not even had a Washington bureau since the mid-1970s. Yet the magazine has not only chronicled the McChrystal implosion — and relentlessly tracked the administration’s connections to the “vampire squid” of Goldman Sachs — but has also exposed the shoddy management of the Obama Interior Department. As it happens, the issue of Rolling Stone with the Hastings story also contains a second installment of Tim Dickinson’s devastating dissection of the Ken Salazar cohort, this time detailing how its lax regulation could soon lead to an even uglier repeat of the Gulf of Mexico fiasco when BP and Shell commence offshore drilling in the Arctic Ocean.

How embarrassing and telling when the frothing, fickle media fixated on two insignificant interlopers who crashed a WH state dinner.  And NBC made stars out of the star-fucking, vapid, one-dimensional self-promoters.  

CNN's Ed Henry: Well-Hung

Ed Henry marries Shirley Hung. Ed keeps his monogrammed 'H' Avanti guest towels.

Politico: A bipartisan wedding report by Jim Manley and Ron Bonjean: Ed Henry and Shirley Hung were married sat night at a very beautiful and moving ceremony in Las Vegas. Shirley was beautiful walking down the aisle in an ivory satin gown and hot blue Manolo Blahniks. The best man was Ed's son Patrick and senior flower girl Ed's daughter Mila Henry. Shirley's mother Ching Hung and the mother and father of the groom Christine and Edward Henry were glowing. The ceremony itself was outdoors in a beautiful courtyard at the Wynn hotel. Readers included Bob Jones, Mike Emanuel with Fox News, Tim Warner and Sarah Irwin with Reuters. ‘Can't Help Falling in Love’ was by Shirley's sister Natalie Hung and Dave Neway. Guests were surprised by a top Elvis Presley impersonator who encouraged guests to sing along. Guests then went next door to the Encore Hotel, led by Elvis Presley, to the Society restaurant for a delightful reception for drinks and dinner. The wedding cake was a phenomenal replica of the White House. Guests took their pictures with Elvis and the White House wedding cake in the background. They then celebrated toasting the nuptials and enjoying the Vegas nightlife.”

Goregasm

Listen to the police interview audio of Al Gore's masseuse accuser:



'Gores Cover Assets' NYP  NYP  NYDN:  Al Gore Dealing With 'Inconvenient Truths' Do you believe her?

Caption This!

The above comes via Hot Air's Ed Morrissey.  Obama and French prez Nicolas Sarkozy at the G-20 summit in Toronto. 'Do you know what BP really stands for?  Butt Plug.'

Below, Obama and Sarkozy seem to be getting cozy, no?   'Didja hear about the suicide of that shrimp dude in Louisiana?'

'All I did was play golf.  That dumbass Hayward got caught on his yacht.'

'Gary and Tony Have A Baby' No Bundle of Joy for CNN

Stillborn.  In the ratings. CNN's much-hyped Soledad O'Brien doc on two gay guys lusting for a baby a ratings abortion. The stork delivered nothing but a bundle of pre-'special' ploy for ratings that never materialized.

TVbytheNumbers Bill Gorman: The special averaged just 580,000 viewers with 139,000 in adults 25-54 and ranked in fourth place amongst all the cable news nets during that time period. The special’s viewership was slightly above last Thursday’s 8pm Campbell Brown, but below it in the cable news target adults 25-54 demo.

Hardly special.

Ass Seen On TV

"You're an asshole!"  AFL-CIO economist Ron Blackwell to Neil Cavuto on LIVE! TV in front of God and everyone:



H/t CB reader ZD

Al Gore's Code Orange

The National Enquirer didn't pay a dime for the Al Gore masseuse sex scandal scoop.  The Pulitzer Prize-nominated (John Edwards love child) paper refused to pony up the million bucks the babe wanted.

Why pay when the juicy stuff was in her police statement.  She claimed Al insisted she touch his 'second Chakra' between his navel and pubic bone.  The sexual release Chakra represented by the color orange. 

Above photo, Al Gore's exhausted second Chakra rebels after years of too much massage.

A New Groom Sweeps Clean

Larry King's Brit heir-apparent Piers Morgan gets married.  Unlike Larry who has run through seven women eight times, this is Piers' second marriage. Check out the wedding pix.  Piers is 45.  His new bride Celia is 33.

Rumor has it CNN is grooming Piers to take over for Larry when his contract expires next May.

Comcast and NBC Can't Follow Directions

The FCC stops the clock on the Comcast-NBC merger. 

B&C:  The commission says that the companies returned incomplete answers and did not follow the directions in responding to a May FCC request for a raft of information from both on everything from organizational structure and channel lineups to copies of all programming agreements and detailed discussions of all deliberations in making content available online. The commission sent letters to the two Thursday, informing them that the FCC would put the brakes on vetting the merger until such time as they had complied fully.

Brian Roberts and Jeff Zucker must have Attention Deficit Disorder . . .

Caption This!

Barney Frank and Chris Dodd after pulling a train a Senate all-nighter on that financial reform bill hereafter known forevermore as 'The Dodd-Frank Bill.'

Collective Defective Dem Deflect

“We’re giving relief to ‘average good American people’ not ‘minorities’ or ‘defective’ people.” Dem Congressman Paul Kanjorski

'The real issue is that Republicans blocked the Jobless Aid bill.'  Former Rep and paid MSNBC talking head Harold Ford on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe' Friday 6:45a.

Can you imagine the fury if a Republican said the above?  You wouldn't be hearing spin like 'context' and 'unfortunate.'



H/t ZD

Cable News Ratingzzz

Wednesday June 23, 2010

Letterman Takes A 30 Year Whiz

Wednesday was David Letterman's 30th year doing late night TV talk. His top ten things he's learned in those 30 years are pretty bland and unfunny.

#1 Audiences like it better when you're drunk.

CB: Your all-babe staff likes it better when your staff is at full mast.

Hasn't Dave learned to not bang interns in his secret Ed Sullivan Theater bunker? And for God's sake, don't take Caribbean vacations with your wife and secrete your girlfriend in the same hotel.



RE:  The late night wars.  Leno continues to kick Dave's ass in the ratings.  But Jay still isn't beating Conan's previous numbers in the same time slot.

Skinner Out Of The Box

Fox News anchoress Jane Skinner's last day today after 12 years during which she (a) added a husband who is the NFL commissioner, and (b) twin daughters. 



H/t Johnny Dollar's Place

It's gratifying to see Jane's got the right priorities.

'This Week' Stares Down 'Face'

CBS's Sunday spin show 'Face The Nation' could use CNN's new, improved? 'Crossfire' format - and a felon host.  Bob Schieffer's not cutting it total viewers or the 25-54 demo.  ABC News press release crows 'This Week' is growing week to week, year to year (slowly, I turned, step by step, inch by inch . . . the classic Three Stooges bit) while 'Face' is losing faces. 

TVbytheNumbers has the ABC News press release with the non-chronological rankings:

(Sunday, June 20, 2010) TOTAL VIEWERS A25-54 MM/R

ABC “THIS WEEK” 2,150,000 730,000/.6

CBS “FACE THE NATION” 1,940,000 590,000/.5

NBC “MEET THE PRESS” 2,660,000 970,000/.8

FOX “FOX NEWS SUNDAY” 1,100,000 460,000/.4

Source: The Nielsen Company, NTI (Total Viewers and Adults 25-54) Live+SD weeks of 6/14/10, 6/7/10 & 6/15/09

Felon hosts.  If Eliot Spitzer can stage (with the fawning help of MSNBC and that gerbil Dylan Ratigan greasing the skids for the CNN gig) 'a comeback that makes Nixon look like a slacker' (Walter Shapiro) there's got to be another scumbag just waiting for a chance to make big bucks as a TV news talking head.

Any suggestions?

ABC's on a roll.  Check out the week to week, year to year numbers for 'GMA' showing growth in total viewers and the demo where there are losses at rival NBC 'Today' and CBS 'Early Show.'

PA Gov Ed Rendell: Livin' The American Dream

MSNBC blowhard Chris Matthews's political mentor and staple guest on 'Hardball' - Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell - is denying reports he's having an affair with a former beauty queen.

Kirstin Snow - now a high-ranking state employee media maven - also denies the story in Philadelphia Magazine hitting newstands Friday.

Philadelphia Daily News has some key bullet points:

-"Absolutely not," Snow replied when asked if they were having an affair. "No way. And if I had a nickel for everybody who told me that, or told me they heard that, I wouldn't have to come to my job.
- Snow says she was surprised it took this long for the rumors to become public, and she worries about the gossip hurting Rendell's wife, Midge, a federal judge
- Snow seems surprised to hear that people are claiming that Rendell is describing her as his "soulmate" and "the love of his life."
-Rendell says he values Snow's media insight on political issues and that her attractiveness helps add some "pizzazz" when he brings her to fundraisers. He says his recent weight loss - he's down 60 pounds - has nothing to do with a new romance.
-"You know, like a lot of people in politics, I get hit on by women all the time," Rendell says. "There are political groupies just like there are sports groupies. I got hit on when I was 260 every bit as much as when I'm 200."
-Rendell scoffs at the notion that he would ever use the phrase"the love of my life." He speculates that people probably heard him joking about Snow, saying something like: "Oh, yeah, she's great. She's hot as can be; she's the cat's meow."

Snow earned a PhD in business administration, and was Miss Pennsylvania 1994, Mrs. Pennsylvania 2007, and Mrs. American Dream 2007.

It wasn't so long ago that speculation surfaced Rendell was dicking around with KYW TV Philadelphia anchoress Alycia Lane.



H/t Vinney