We reported a little over a month ago that the Today show had booked Blagojevich to appear on the morning he happened to be arrested by the FBI, but bumped the interview so they could flack for Jay Leno's new show. We found that out through a Freedom of Information Act request to the state of Illinois asking for e-mails from representatives of the media to Lucio Guerrero, Blagojevich's press secretary (we got the idea from South Carolina's The State, which did the same thing—to comic effect—after Mark Sanford's Argentinian Rhapsody).

The first raft of e-mails we got were from December 8, the day before Blagojevich got popped, and it included one from Today producer Lexi Dauber apologetically canceling a scheduled remote Q-and-A with Matt Lauer to make room for Leno news. We just got another batch covering the 48 hours after the arrest, and guess what? Dauber and her fellow Today producer Stephanie Siegel all of a sudden really wanted to talk to Blagojevich!

The traditional route for a reporter desperately trying to convince someone to submit to an interview when it's obviously not in their interest to do so is to drop all pretense of toughness and objectivity and lie to them: We will be your friend! Not like all those other mean reporters. While Dauber and Seigel's e-mails to Guerrero are understandably sympathetic, an internal write-up of a phone call with Siegel outlining the terms of her interview request shows what they were really willing to give up. Matt Lauer or Meredith Vieira would call Blagojevich before the interview to "go over the line of questions," and Seigel stressed that "they are sensitive."

CBS's Early Show also went the simpering route, telling Guerrero that there is "far too much hearsay going around" and offering Blagojevich an opportunity to "set the record straight" and "clear his own name." They were even willing to "rent a private space to keep him away from the rest of the media's view." We all know how annoying prying reporters can be.

ABC News' Diane Sawyer, on the other hand, didn't try to buddy up to Blago. To her credit, Sawyer's producer offered a fairly straightforward pitch that managed to avoid over-the-top sycophancy.

Larry King's producer relied on the rogue's gallery that has traipsed through King's studio in the past, positioning the host as the go-to guy for crooks, liars, and other humiliated figures—go with us and you can be in the fine company of Jeffrey Skilling, Gary Condit, and Bob Packwood!

King's CNN colleague Anderson Cooper wasn't even trying: His producers sent in a perfunctory, We-asked-Governor-Blagojevich-to-come-on-the-show requests that they knew weren't going to open any doors.

Likewise the producer for CNN's Campbell Brown dashed off an email that would allow her to dutifully report that a request was in.

Sometimes brevity is your best bet when dealing with a harried flack who's clearly deluged with requests. That's what Andy Shaw, a political reporter for Chicago's local ABC station, decided to go with.

That kind of approach is important when you know your target is dealing with all manner of zany proposals. Like a request for comment from "a representative for Dan Ackroyd [sic] and Jim Belushi" on their call for Blagojevich's resignation. When a press aide forwarded that message to the governor's press assistant, she responded, "What? I want you to explain."

(For the record, it looks like that was a hoax call—we can't find any evidence that one-half of the Blues Brothers and the talentless brother of the other, dead, half ever made such a demand.)

The most pathetic request comes from Pat Curry, the news assignment editor for WGN, a local Chicago station. He wasn't even asking for an interview with Blagojevich—he wanted Guerrero himself to come on, and delivered a masterwork of flattery and faux sympathy. "I wouldn't expect you to be able to comment on a federal investigation, and could easily brush that off," Curry wrote, signing off with, "Humbly, Pat Curry."

A producer for a local Chicago talk radio show hosted by husband-and-wife pair Don and Roma Wade wins the award for discretion, declining to put in writing the "incredible offer" he had for Guerrero.

We'll never know what that offer was, but guess who got the first post-arrest interview with disgraced Gov. Rod Blagojevich?

You can read the whole batch here. Interestingly, not one e-mail from Fox News turned up. It could be that they relied solely on the phone, or that their e-mails somehow got missed by our FOIA requests. Or maybe they figured it wasn't worth trying.

Portfolio reports that CNN has come in last behind Fox News, MSNBC and Headline News in primetime among 25-to-54-year-olds on nine out of 17 days this month, dipping below even CNBC numbers (that means very low!) one night.

The network has deliberately positioned itself as non-partisan while painting Fox News and MSNBC as unreliable ideological mirror-images. But the numbers don't lie. And while CNN is accustomed by now to getting trounced by Fox, the surge by MSNBC threatens to place it in a permanent third place. So has hapless president Jonathan Klein his decided to drop the nonpartisan bit and compete with Olbermann et. al. for the left flank?

A clue can be found in the selection of Roland Martin to fill in when Campbell Brown goes in maternity leave for six weeks next month (or sooner, depending on the baby's inclination). During last year's election, Martin regularly filled the "black liberal" slot on CNN's discussion panels; he has never aspired to be an unbiased observer. Martin has already been given a series of specials on the network, but fill-in anchor gigs often serve as trial runs. If CNN is prepping Martin—who has a degree in "Christian Communications," whatever that is, from and unaccredited Baptist University—for an anchor chair, it could mean Klein has read the writing on the wall and decided to drop the middle-road schtick.

Brown's absence is not good for CNN. Sure, Olbermann doubled her ratings on Tuesday, but she's garnered some hype as a new cable news star. There's no clear evidence that her show, which celebrated its first anniversary last month, has moved the needle for CNN at 8 p.m. But for her to take a second maternity leave since she joined CNN in 2007 won't help maintain what little momentum she's gathered, and Martin isn't the most compelling broadcaster around to keep the audience busy while she's gone.

First, Campbell Brown, who's really pushing her likability with this irritating "NO BULLSHIT" thing (is she a Mamet character, CNN?) delievered a special comment full of rhetorical questions that all danced around the simple point that Rendell, though well-meaning, would not have made the same comment about a man of any familial persuasion. (Brown is married to Republican strategist and frequent cable news guest Dan Senor.)

Then secret best Times opinion columnist Gail Collins got involved! She damns Rendell with genial, light-hearted ribbing, as is her wont. She points out that Rendell was engaging in the back-handed justifications of someone who got passed over for a plum job. ("'For that job, you have to be able to drink those salesmen under the table and Ted’s an absolute lush.'") She called him for comment and allowed him to dig his hole deeper by contradicting his first statement in his defense of it (Rendell, too, is a workaholic, despite having a family). And then she called an expert in people who discriminate against single people, or something, which also allows her to get a couple digs against Chris Matthews in. (Gail Collins is married to CBS News senior producer Dan Collins.)

We still haven't heard from confirmed bachelor Napolitano herself, but presumably she's very upset with this mildly sexist remark from a loudmouthed old white guy. But we feel she's perfect for the job too, because she's probably a cloesteded lesbian, and they're very industrious.

Campbell is a fine interviewer who does admirably call bullshit when she hears it, but her show's self-congratulatory "keeping them honest" segments still invariably boil down to "both sides stretching the truth, as usual, what are you gonna go?" meaninglessness. And hey, she got some history wrong!

In attempting to explain why a single party controlling the legislature and the White House is bad, a terribly annoying bugaboo repeated only by media people and minority parties and not so feared by voters who vote for single party rule, Campbell explained that the last time this happened was in the 1970s, with Jimmy Carter. Hah. That's not true! Nor was it in the 90s, with Bill Clinton. It was, as Keith explains, in the 2000s, with the current President, Mr. Bush.

Keith doesn't explain that Campbell's point about all of those situations being disasters is actually borne out by the evidence, but whatever. Unified Democratic government also brought us Vietnam and Civil Rights, for those keeping score at home. Mixed bag, right?