Christmas specials were feeding you messages to accept gays, love women, embrace Jesus, and do lots and lots of LSD. Yes, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeeris on CBS tomorrow night, and watching it can be like playing a Judy Garland record backward looking for Satanic messages. This is our early present to all of you out there. Free your minds from the traps set up by network executives and watch with your eyes wide open for the first time. These are our thoughts on five classics, but in the seasonal spirit of giving, please share the subtext of other more obscure specials in the comments. We know some of you out there speak the truth.

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
The Story: A reindeer that is born different casts himself out of normal society, until everyone realizes what makes him different also makes him strong, and he and the other "misfits" must save Christmas.
The Subtext: Rudolph's nose should shine with fabulous, because this is a tale of gay empowerment. Aside from Rudolph, his fey elf friend Hermey is also a big old queen and the Island of Misfit Toys looks like the craziest gay bar this side of the Ramrod.
Favorite Example: Yukon Cornelius was the first bear ever in an animated television special.
Nice List: Babygays, PFLAG moms, tom boys, anyone who might be a little bit odd, Levi Johnston.
Naughty List: School bullies, Fred Phelps, girlie girls, people who voted for Prop 8, Sarah Palin.

Frosty the Snowman
The Story: After being brought to life by a magic hat, Frosty has to flee the hot city or else he'll melt. An evil magician traps him in a greenhouse, where he melts, but Santa brings him back to life.
The Subtext: Global warming is a figment of your imagination, and praying to Jesus will save the environment and return the ice caps to their former glory.
Favorite Example: Seriously, Santa magically undoes all the damage from "greenhouse gases" with a flick of his wrist.
Nice List: People who think evolution is a joke, monkeys, your mother's pastor, Sarah Palin.
Naughty List: Scientists, thinking people, your rabbi, Al Gore.

The Grinch Who Stole Christmas
The Story: A furry green thing hates a bunch of strange insect-like creatures so much that he steals all their bizarre looking holiday accoutrement so that they can't celebrate. Then they sing in an alien language.
The Subtext: Do a shitload of drugs. The Grinch is Timothy Leary geeked out on acid and tripping so hard that he thinks that hoo-hinkers are real. By the end of the program, he sobers up and gives everything back.
Favorite Example: The hoo-roast beast is really the kid that the babysitter put in the microwave instead of the turkey.
Nice List: Stoners, Dead heads, ravers, Marion Barry.
Naughty List: Frat boys, Celine Dion fans, addiction counselors, Sarah Palin.

A Charlie Brown Christmas
The Story: Charlie Brown is sad because Christmas has become about fake trees and commercialism. He finds salvation in Jesus.
The Subtext: Do we have to spell it out for you? This cartoon special has converted more people than death row and foxholes put together.
Favorite Example: Linus lisping the message about three wise men coming to visit baby Jesus.
Nice List: Fundamentalists, Kirk Cameron, anti-consumerists, Marcie, Sarah Palin.
Naughty List: Scientologists, Alan Thicke, Wal-Mart, Peppermint Patty, Barney Frank.

The Year Without a Santa Claus
The Story: Santa is sick and wants to take a year off. Mrs. Claus gets two elves to go to Earth to get someone to convince Santa to get off his lazy ass and work. The humans will only do it if the elves can make it snow in the warm south. They have to go to Cold Miser and Heat Miser and convince them to let it snow where it should be sweltering. The two squabbling brothers won't do it, so Mrs. Claus goes to Mother Nature, who makes it happen and saves Christmas.
The Subtext: Fuck the patriarchy, women rule! With all the inept, lazy, fighting, macho men bumbling about, it's the ladies who get everything done.
Favorite Example: Mrs. Claus dresses up as Santa and says she could do the job if she really wanted to.
Nice List: Naomi Wolfe, diva worshipers, third-wave feminists, your mom, Hillary Clinton.
Naughty List: Dr. Ruth, misogynists, Girls Gone Wild, dear old dad, Sarah Palin.

Witness this clip of The Early Show correspondent Debbye Turner Bell getting sprayed in the face by a fluid-spurting beaver:

Naturally, this clip is CBS News' "most popular" right now. What's notable is that they provided it themselves, complete with slow-motion replay, meaning someone over at CBS HQ decided that, in that ongoing struggle between web views and dignity, they're not above going after views from time to time.

Meanwhile, as CBS eggs on the LOLs, Fox News has embarked on a mission to seek and destroy funny third-party clips of Bill O'Reilly. Oh, new media! How you beguile, befuddle, and enrage the olds who want so badly to know how the hell to deal with you.

Humorous Twitter account Shit My Dad Says is becoming a sitcom. Behold, a brilliant burst of light as a thousand unemployed bloggers' dreams come true, and a writer who moved in with his dad and spent a lot of time on Twitter actually profits from it:

CBS has picked up a comedy project based on the Twitter account, which has enlisted more than 700,000 followers since launching in August and has made its creator, Justin Halpern, an Internet star.

Will & Grace creators David Kohan and Max Mutchnick are on board to executive produce and supervise the writing for the multicamera family comedy, which Halpern will co-pen with Patrick Schumacker.

Thus, the Justin Halpern Myth: The fantasy that, when the going gets tough, you can always cocoon yourself in a long, humiliating period of unemployed listlessness—spending eight hours a day browsing Facebook in your pajamas, memorizing twitter hashtags and not washing your hair—and emerge, as if by magic, a few months later as a brilliant new-media mogul with a book deal and Hollywood contract to boot!

(Note: I'm pretty sure Justin Halpern didn't actually live this way. In fact, he apparently had a job. But if by some chance his life ever resembled the above description: more power to him.)

Subcategories of the Justin Halpern Myth: Girls Who Turned Their Moms' Embarrassing E-mails Into a Book Deal, A Guy and Girl Who Turned Their Gross Sandwiches Into a Book Deal, Lady Whose Facebook Update About Her Dog Became a Movie, and Guy Who Got $50K to Copy and Paste Tweets Into a Coffee Table Book.

The Justin Halpern Myth is either a really bad thing (since it fools sad, hopeless people into believing their painstakingly crafted web utterances will some day turn them into stars) or a really good thing (for the same reason, mostly). Because when you're unemployed, dead broke, toiling in anonymity and/or living with your parents, and your freelance career just isn't working out, and the whole of your social life is confined to Facebook and Twitter—well, it's not like you've got anything better to do than reach for that great, glowing Justin Halpern in the sky. Dream big!

Image via

But would she dare leave the world of touchy-feely daytime syndication that made her?

Oprah's contract with CBS expires in 2010, the same year OWN is scheduled to launch, and she's certainly taking her sweet time deciding whether or not to renew it. Lady O has repeatedly given up supporting roles in major media outlets in favor of lead roles in the outlets she singly controls—like her magazine, which features the only cover shoots she's appeared in since its launch in 2000. (Then again, once you've got Vogue out of your system and Anna Wintour's begrudging respect, do you really need magazine covers anymore?) Her partnership with the Oxygen network scaled back considerably when she discovered she couldn't exert enough control to make it "reflect her voice." The lady likes to be in charge.

Since CBS owns rerun rights on Oprah's syndicated show until 2011, if she wants her familiar, couch-sitting, tear-jerking format to be on OWN, she'll be forced either to contrive a way to divide her schtick into two shows—thereby competing with herself, risking becoming redundant, and probably irritating the hell out of the powers that be at CBS—or ditch CBS entirely to start broadcasting her show by herself.

One question is whether OWN can succeed without The Oprah Winfrey show, which has always anchored the disparate branches of her high-consumption universe. She already has plans to outsource some of the personality-driven portions of OWN's programming to her proteges (god knows the Oprah-lite army is big—and greedy—enough) and relegate herself to a man-behind-the-curtain role. Erspamer's presence at OWN could help orchestrate that (the press release calls it an "injection of Oprah's DNA into OWN"), or it could be a signal that Oprah wants OWN to bear the mark of Harpo, which could just as easily mean melding the two. The others question is whether the Oprah Winfrey brand exists without Oprah's physical presence—and whether she would want it to.

While Tank had told us on more than one occasion that Levi would decide how naked he would get only on the day of the shoot, today Tank told TMZ, "Everything's gonna hang out. We're talking full johnson." We're gonna hold you to that, Tank, even though both sides have told us there is no stipulation in the contract about how much skin he will show.

He also said that they're planning on doing the shoot in New York on November 16, the same day that Sarah Palin's book Going Rogue hits stores. A rep from Playgirl said that they're looking to do the shoot in an athletic setting, "gyms, rinks—that sort of thing." Um, for the sake of Levi's johnston, can we please not do it on a freezing cold ice skating rink? That's not going to do wonders for his hockey stick.

Well, we won't get to read about it on Twitter, because whoever has been operating the highly-suspect Levi Johnston Twitter account says he will be deleting it after an interview on Dallas' Pugs and Kelly radio show this afternoon. Sounds like a hoax to us.

Today was also the second half of Levi's appearance on CBS' The Early Show (video below), where he talked about prepping for his nudie shoot (love the workout footage!) and the offers that he turned down, like being on some dating shows and "some people who wanted me to do some odd things on camera."

This was taped before the first part aired yesterday and raised the ire of Levi's babymomma momma. Still, it's clear that he doesn't give a lick what the Palins think about him and his future career plans. He says, "[Sarah Palin is] quitting governor to make her money, so we're on the same page here."

Yes sir, two side of the coin spinning around in the dance of fame. But it looks like now we're going to get to see both Levi's heads and tails.

[Illustration by Steven Dressler]

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Palin obviously hasn't realized what the truth of what we told her last month: just as Levi would be just another anonymous, aging high-school hockey star if Palin hadn't decided to pose him as teen father of the year, out of power Palin would be all but disappearing from view if Johnston wasn't keeping her script interesting. So she spent today acting shocked, shocked that anyone would put him near a camera, when she should be lapping up the attention - just in time for her book, too!

In the first part of an interview on CBS' The Early Show, Johnston says he has knowledge about Sarah Palin that would be very damning to her (the full interview is below). Last week, we told you what his svengali, Tank Jones, told us—that Levi has plenty more dirt on the Palins and he's writing a book. It wasn't news to us.

Still, Palin's response was pretty great:

CBS should be ashamed for continually providing a forum to propagate lies. Consider the source of the most recent attention-getting lies - those who would sell their body for money reflect a desperate need for attention and are likely to say and do anything for even more attention.

Oh, that is rich. This is coming from the woman who said David Letterman thought it was "OK, accepted and funny to talk about statutory rape," when he made a joke about her daughter, one he thought was aimed at her of-age daughter, not the younger one. Always blowing it out of proportion. Anyway, Levi isn't selling his body, he's just posing for some naked pictures. There is a huge difference. Well, we don't know how big the difference is yet, but we'll let you know once we see the test shots.

And of course the "naked Levi" controversy and her statement has nothing to do with the release of her book, Going Rogue, on November 17. No, she doesn't need to have her name in the press at all. And Levi doesn't need continued interest in his almost-but-not-quite mother-in-law to sell a bunch of nudie magazines to gay men. No way! These two continue to feed off each other like a snake eating its own tail or some kind of weird animal that survives by eating its own vomit.

Speaking of which, Johnston also said his upcoming nudie shoot will be very tasteful. "I'm not gonna just go out there and get naked," he said, putting to rest those rumors that there will be a roaring fire, a bear skin rug, and a snifter of brandy involved. Oh, Levi, you make us so sad. For more on the shoot, you'll have to tune in tomorrow. Of course, we won't be watching because we're not following this naked Levi Johnston thing one bit.

Watch CBS News Videos Online

The affidavits don't reveal much new information, and recount the story as it is known: Halderman allegedly placed a packet in Letterman's car with a screenplay treatment and note threatening to reveal private details about his life:

The cops seized Halderman's computer, and seemed to suspect that he communicated about the plot via e-mail—they sought any data related to a redacted screen name and e-mail address that could be Halderman's or could be someone else's. They were also careful to seek a warrant to seize any e-mails or notes related to Halderman and "any and all Public figures," suggesting they may have suspected that Halderman had a sideline going with other targets.

The warrants also give a sense of Letterman's—referred to as "Client #1" in documents—state of mind as the sting unfolded:

The NYO says that Armen Keteyian is out bulldog-reporting the story already, upholding the integrity of the news side and whatnot. Why? First of all, CBS is hopelessly, hopelessly conflicted, Chinese wall or not. Digging up serious dirt on the network's biggest late night star just doesn't pay. Second, the scandal's already been—and will continue to be—overcovered by the other networks, and the tabloids, and everyone else. Third, see point one. The only three possible outcomes to a CBS News investigation:

1. They turn up pretty much the same stuff as everyone else, meaning it was a waste of time.
2. They turn up more dirt that makes Letterman look bad, meaning they screw their own network. In this case, their report either gets censored to some degree by the corporate types, or they run it as is and still get accused of pulling punches due to a conflict of interest, because they do in fact have one.
3. They turn up dirt that makes Letterman's accuser (also a CBS employee!) look bad, and get accused of trying to help Letterman out.

So, just skip it, guys. Have you looked into baby kangaroos? People love that shit.
[Pic: AP]

• Meet your new action hero overlord: Chris Pine. Already fronting the rebooted Star Trek franchise, Pine has signed on to play the Jack Ryan role previously portrayed by Harrison Ford and Alec Baldwin in a new go-around adapting Tom Clancy's series of espionage novels. [Variety]

• For those CBS and Viacom employees who feel each day the burden of the Redstone yoke, you can take heart today; Sumner is now less your owner than he was last week. The octillionaire mogul has been selling off the debt of his holding company, National Amusements. For now, however, NA still retains the controlling interest. [Variety]

• As the world waits for the final outcome of Vivendi/GE/Comcast talks over the fate of NBC Universal, Nikki Finke reports that Comcast wants the deal "done and announced in November." So there. [DHD]

• Curse be damned! ABC has won the competition to be the next network to fail with a sitcom by a former Friends star, locking up rights to the Matthew Perry project. [THR]

• The Wrap reports that Alex Young, Co-President of Production at 20th Century Fox is being moved out of the job and into a producing deal. Young was a Tom Rothman protege who has been in the job since 2007. [The Wrap]

• Always on the lookout for a feel good project, director Gus Van Sant and novelist Bret Easton Ellis have picked up the rights to "The Golden Suicides," Nancy Jo Sales' Vanity Fair article about the deaths of downtown artists Theresa Duncan and Jeremy Blake. [Variety]

• The creator of the Gilmore Girls is coming to HBO. Exec-Producer Amy Sherman-Palladino has signed a deal to develop a dramedy for the cable network. She described the project as the "story of love, hate, family — and finding the perfect opening line," [THR]

• This is what it's come to in the strange, contorted career of Bill Murray; taking Joe Pesci's leftovers. For those who thought Murray's Zombieland cameo was just a little strange— that he was too big, or had been too big a star for the joke about Woody Harrelson being obsessed with him to completely click — you are right. In an interview with Hitfix, Murray revealed the walk on had been intended for Joe Pesci — with whom the joke would have made a lot more sense — but that Murray took the part after Pesci passed. [Hitfix]

Sgt. Pat Postiglione, who heads the Nashville police department's cold case unit, told Gawker that he had lunch with Halderman in Nashville in the last week of August, when Halderman was traveling there to speak to a meeting of the National Information Officers Association.

"He seemed OK," said Postiglione, who worked for years with Halderman on a 48 Hours story Halderman produced about the 1996 murder of Nashville socialite Janet March. Postiglione's cold case unit solved the case in 2004, and he featured prominently in Halderman's piece. "He seemed like he had lost quite a bit of weight, but other than that he was normal. We talked about different cases, and he said he wanted to come back and do a story on a cold case."

Little did Postiglione know that on September 9, a little over one week after that lunch, Halderman would hatch his alleged extortion plot by handing a blackmail note to Letterman's limousine driver outside his Manhattan home.

Postiglione said Halderman's work on the March story, which took him to Nashville several times over several years, made him a lot of friends in the Nashville police department. "We knew him fairly well," he said. "We were stunned. He's much smarter than that, and he was clearly pro-police to the max." Halderman's true-crime stories for 48 Hours put him in close touch with a lot of law enforcement officers, and made it his job to tell stories of how the bad guys got caught by the cops—which makes his apparently ham-fisted attempt in Letterman's case all the more mystifying. "If he was going to do something like this," Postiglione said, "you'd figure he would have come up with something more sophisticated. He tried to cash a $2 million check and didn't think anyone would notice?"

• 
  
• Dave Went Out With Another Intern, In the 90s, and TMZ Got Pictures Of Her: Yes! In the "early 1990s," Dave had a (sexxxy?) "relationship" with his then-intern, Holly Hester, who seems to have nothing but warm feelings towards him, still. TMZ got these decidedly non-scandalous photos of the female half of this long-ago routine interoffice romance. There she is: Holly Hester.
• Dave Was the First Man Ever to Dislike His Ex-Girlfriend's New Boyfriend, According to Anonymous Sources: The Post's daily Dave scoop: Some people who probably work in the office say Dave didn't like Joe Halderman, the new boyfriend of Dave's ex, Stephanie Birkitt. By contrast, most men greatly enjoy hanging out with their ex-girlfriend's new boyfriend and building close relationships. Although this guy did try to extort Dave for millions, so maybe there are two sides to the story. The Post sums this all up as "Hate show." It's like "Late Show," but with hate.
• Tonight's Show May Be Awkward: Last week Dave came out on air with all this scandal stuff. Now it's the week following that. Is there a potential for tonight's show to be kinda awkward? Yes, say the show's staffers. It could very well be awkward. Now you know.
• Women Are More Mad About This Stuff Than Men, Maybe, Or Not: Some people feel that Dave will have to make a strong effort to win back female fans, because females tend to view his behavior more negatively than men. Some women, though, are not so concerned about it. And some people (us) suspect that the angry women Dave will have to contend with will mostly be Sarah Palin supporters with long memories and a lust for schadenfreude.

It means that we will miss out on our favorite part of the television season, where, after all the months of hype, a bunch of shows fail spectacularly and are canceled after only a few weeks. Usually that time of year is right now, and so far we only have one casualty (RIP TBL). Fuck this series of slow deaths, we miss our annual massacre!

It also means that we're going to be stuck with NCIS: Los Angeles and a host of other crap for the long haul. It also means that, while many are performing well, thanks to NBC and their awful Jay Leno experiment, there are actually fewer series premieres this year than usual. It even further means there are fewer people watching network television. You know when your show doesn't even crack 10 million and it's considered a big victory times are getting tough.

Here's a breakdown of how everything is doing so far:

The Good:

• NCIS: Los Angeles (CBS) is the clear breakout hit with 18.7 million on its debut, proving once again that Americans love shitty television.
• The Good Wife (CBS) bobbled most of it's lead in, but pulled in an excellent 13.7 million viewers and won its time slot. Way to go, Carol Hathaway!
• Modern Family (ABC) rode positive ratings to a 12.7 million bow and its companion Cougar Town (ABC) was right behind it with 11.6.
• Flash Forward (ABC) predicted itself 12.4 million viewers, so we'll at least see how the mystery ends. Still, it's no Lost.
• The Vampire Diaries only scared up 4.8 million (shit more teenage girls than that stand wailing out front of Robert Pattinson's hotel room on a daily basis), but that was The CW's highest debut ever.
• The Cleveland Show (Fox) did just about as well as Family Guy with a 9.4 million on a Sunday night.
• Accidentally on Purpose (CBS) made 9 million people not laugh.
• The Forgotten (ABC) and Eastwick (ABC) were just on the right side of average with 9.5 and 9.3 million respectively.
• Though the numbers for Glee (Fox) weren't the highest at 7.3 million, it's still being considered a victory since a show this good and quirky actually seems to be finding some sort of audience.

The Bad:

• The Jay Leno Show (NBC) started out nice and strong with an amazing 18 million, but then fell to 5.7 million a week later and its ratings continue to go up and down a bit, but usually lands at the bottom of the pile. Please, please, make the unfunny stop!
• Community (NBC) also had a strong debut, keeping most of the run-off from the Office for an audience of 7.7 million. However, the next week, more than 2 million checked out and its ratings were down to 5.4 million.
• Medical drama Mercy (NBC) will be on life support soon, with only 8.2 checking it out on it's first Wednesday night. Yes, NBC officially sucks.

The Ugly:

• Brothers (Fox) started off with 2.8 million. Let's see how long it holds on.
• Melrose Place is hobbling along with only 2.3 million viewers in its opening week, and not much more since then. The network has ordered more episodes and Heather Locklear is set to come back in November, so lets hope she can breathe life into this thing for the second time.
• The Beautiful Life (CW) already got it's ass canceled. We blame Mischa Barton's wisdom teeth.

Moore's press train began last week on Good Morning America, when he took some time to rail against the show's use of "permalancers," a group that's basically permanent, but don't get the benefits and, therefore, count as the underdog. It was all very amusing and true, and provided Moore with a great excuse when CBS "canceled" his appearance on tomorrow's Early Show. From a tweet Moore posted Sunday morning:

Backlash Begins: CBS has cancelled [sic] me on its Mon. morning show. After I criticized ABC/Disney on GMA, they didn't want me to do same to CBS.

While that could be true, CBS bookers tell media scallywag Rachel Sklar that they never booked him. Moore's people, though, tell a different story: they were negotiating a firm date with CBS, but then CBS got all diva about getting the sit-down after GMA already landed Moore:

I can accurately say that the bookers who book the show have definitely been in discussion with us to have him on the show. When we attempted to confirm the booking they said they didn't want to follow GMA.

Hmmm. So, Moore, we're assuming, knew CBS had said they didn't want to follow GMA, but tweeted that the network was scared of his inflammatory nature. Why are we not surprised?

Anyway, Moore's assertion, however valid, only brings the spotlight back to him, which is good when you're promoting a movie. And the movie's doing well, by the way: it opened with about $306,000 on four screens. That's the higher per-theater average for the year. Love him or hate him, Moore's a hit machine.

Did CBS Cancel Michael Moore? [Mediaite]

In fact, here are five reasons to watch the two-hours season premiere, which airs tonight on CBS. This time around they're off to Samoa for some piña coladas and getting lost in the rain.

1. It's Big and Beautiful: This is the first season that features 20 contestants. When they up the number, that always means that people are kicked off right away, or they do some sort of massive culling of the numbers just to shake things up. After all these years, we appreciate their efforts to keep the players and viewers guessing. Also, 20 people means even more people to love and people to hate. This show has produced some of the best reality villains in TV history, like Sue Hawk and Richard Hatch in the first season. Not as well-known is last season's annoying, pathological liar and dragon slayer Coach. This long-haired professional soccer coach even lost his job for disappearing to go on the show and telling everyone he was gone because he was getting tested for cancer. He sounds just like Kim from Real Housewives of Atlanta, but without the wig. This year the show is trying to make castaway Russell (pictured) out to be the show's biggest villain ever. The jury's still out.

2. A Social Experiment Gone Awry: The draw of this show has always been allowing viewers to think about what they would do if they were trapped on a desert island with a bunch of strangers and had to fend for their lives. Of course cliques form, people fall for each other, outcasts become resentful, and everyone has their fair share of petty squabbles. This shit is fun to watch! And unlike the current crop of reality shows, which is about people making fools of themselves for no reason, at least these people are doing it for a prize. It's also amazing to see who has the power and how it shifts based on the number of people that will be loyal to them and how well they are liked. And let us not forget the bitchery, backstabbing, shit talking, and plotting that goes on. Who needs Blair Waldorf when you can watch some crazy female police officer from New Hampshire claw someone's eyes out for $1 million.

3. Hot People Wearing Next to Nothing: Compared to shows like Big Brother, where nearly everyone is a wannabe bodybuilder or model, Survivor has a bit more diversity of age and type to their casting. That doesn't mean that each season isn't chock full of grade-A meat of both genders. And, when they're out in the desert or jungle or whatever godforsaken pocket of the globe they've been shipped off to this year, they're often sporting littler more than a bathing suit or underwear. Yes, we're old enough to buy porn, but why bother with that when there are beautiful people on network television for free!

4. Jeff Probst: Probst is the best reality television show host period and he deserves his Emmy. He's also a pissy little bitch who will not be happy until he gives at least one contestant a nervous breakdown. Unlike other hosts who let contestants ramble on, Probst is the first one to call them on their shit and let everyone know just how ridiculously they're acting or behaving. He's also not afraid to let everyone know when his own show isn't that great. The past few seasons he's been blogging about the show on Entertainment Weekly's website with a shocking amount of candor. If he's back this season, the blog is a must-read for the day after.

5. It's Still Relevant: Sure, plenty of people will say, "That show's still on?" or "Does anyone watch that anymore?" and the answer is yes and yes. The last season finale in May, the series' lowest rated, still clocked about 13 million viewers. No show going into its 19 season is going to have the numbers it once had back in the day, but Survivor is still a trust-worthy brand that is almost always one of the top 20 programs of the week. Now, would you rather get in touch with what the rest of America is watching by spending an hour with Glenn Beck or Jeff Probst and his merry band of half-naked schemers?

Bill Clinton got a laugh with his story of Cronkite showing him a small kindness during the Lewinsky nightmare.

Nick Clooney, columnist and father to George, told the heartbreaking story of Cronkite's last dinner out, at Patsy's. The whole room rose as he left.

And then President Obama, one of the younger speakers, spoke of Cronkite as a representative of a more honest and reasonable media era

(Jack Shafer will not like the bit of Obama's tribute that repeated the "Most Trusted Man in America" canard.) (It remains to be seen what Shafer will think of Obama's amateur press criticism.)

Cronkite died last July at age 92.

Goldberg, a right-wing writer who once worked at CBS and then made a second career trashing the network's lefty ways, went on The O'Reilly Factor to rehash the debate, and claims a "deep throat like tip" informed him Mapes knew that Bush had wanted to go the Vietnam, but didn't have enough flying hours. Thus, says Goldberg, Mapes intentionally withheld the information and aired the erroneous report, which claimed Bush attempted to skirt his militant duties.

The entire thing proves beyond a reasonable doubt that CBS loves liberals, Rather and Mapes deserved what they got and should be shot into the sun. Or, at least, publicly shamed on Fox News.

According to Paul Caine, president of the Time Inc. magazine group that includes Entertainment Weekly, the ballpark dollar cost for one of these video units is in the "low teens," although he said the cost may come down before the issue comes out.

Jesus Fucking Christ. I mean...wow. The Future!
[Vid via Boing Boing]

Hewitt worked at CBS News for more than 60 years. In 1948, he "directed the first network television newscast." He went on to direct CBS news anchors there from Murrow to Cronkite to Rather. He founded 60 Minutes—and the entire TV news magazine format—in 1968. He presided over the famous Nixon-Kennedy TV debate, in which an absence of makeup supposedly scared the nation away from Nixon. And he had his hardcore moments—these were his instructions to Dan Rather after JFK was assassinated, and rumors surfaced that a guy named Zapruder had a tape of the whole thing:

"Dan. Go to his house. Tell him you wanna see the tape. After he shows it to ya, sock him. Take it. Take it back to our station and let them put it on tape. We'll have it. Then take it back and give it to him. Now they can only get you for assault. They can't get you for robbery because you just gave it back, and let the CBS lawyers argue about who it belongs to."

Hewitt stepped down from 60 Minutes in 2004 to serve as executive producer of CBS News. He was hospitalized with pancreatic cancer last March, and now it's killed him.

The biggest stain on Hewitt's career was the Jeffrey Wigand case—later made into the movie The Insider—in which Hewitt caved to CBS management's demands to censor a 60 Minutes spot about dirty business by tobacco executives. The company feared a lawsuit so big it would kill them, and Hewitt complied with their wishes, pissing off more journalistically inclined colleagues. He later admitted he wasn't proud of himself. Oh well. We all make mistakes. He was a giant and CBS will miss him. Here's Al Pacino's grand speech, from the movie, decrying the BUSINESSMEN posing as NEWSMEN. Journalism lives, we hope.