The sudden death this summer of NBC News Washington bureau chief Tim Russert, who made frequent appearances on MSNBC, removed a political and temperamental rudder for the network. Mr. Griffin has tried to fill the power vacuum since, struggling to shepherd the network's big personalities through a period of transition.

"Struggling" is putting it mildly. The Democratic convention should be a crowning moment for the resurgent cable news network, which has otherwise been an also-ran since its founding 12 years ago. A little sparring would be one thing; conflict can goose ratings, even when it's wantonly self-indulgent.

But this is just a mess. Host Chris Matthews has oscillated wildly between cranky scolding of his coworkers and obsequious near-groveling to the Hillary Clinton supporters who detest him. Both of Joe Scarborough's high-profile rants were too long and tiresome to add spice. And half of what Olbermann says seems to end up on microphone accidentally. Now even shiny new anchor Rahel Maddow is being drawn into the muck (Jossip reports some staff demand she be more of an Olbermann partisan).

MSNBC needs more yelling (at misbehaving anchors) off the air and less yelling on it. Unless this fighting sends ratings through the roof. In that case, by all means, continue.

(Disclaimer: The man in the lower right corner of the graphic is NOT and should NOT be confused with an MSNBC anchor. He is instead House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, and thus at a total loss to understand the horrific partisan bickering and vicious palace intrigue going on around him. Any suggestion that Rep. Hoyer is an MSNBC anchor or otherwise emotionally unstable or sociopathically antisocial is unintentional and accidental. In fact, Gawker apologizes, in advance, for not blurring his photo or something.)

Bill O'Reilly vs. Keith Olbermann
Summary: Possibly the most active ongoing feud in all of cabledom. Cartoon versions of "left" and "right" personified.
O'Reilly's Position: Olbermann is a lying left-wing jerk. The New York Post agrees!
Olbermann's Position: O'Reilly is really the Worst Person In the World. Really, he means it this time.
Winner: Push.

Joe Scarborough vs. Rest of MSNBC
Summary: Repub placed on Dem network, odd couple antics ensue!
Scarborough's Position: Irresponsible liberals who shall remain nameless are giving this network a bad name. And I gets no respect around here!
Rest of MSNBC's Position: Joe Scarborough may be cute, but he's sitting in my chair.
Winner: Rest of MSNBC bound to triumph by sheer force of numbers.

Fox News vs. Jon Stewart
Summary: Fox stands for everything that Stewart opposes, but the target is so obvious that he must parcel out his vitriol with care.
Fox News' Position: Mainstream Americans don't care about Jon Stewart any more.
Jon Stewart's Position: Fox News is "the biggest 'fuck you' to people with brains that I've ever seen in my life."
Winner: Stewart, on the merits; Fox News, on overall influence.

Jon Stewart vs. Crossfire
Summary: The classic moment that put the cable world on notice: Jon Stewart will ass rape you on live TV.
Jon Stewart's Position: Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala are a pair of bullshit-spewing hacks who are a threat to our very republic. I will expound upon this as a guest on their show, to a brave and uncomfortable extent.
Crossfire's Position: Ha, you're just joking, right Jon? Jon?
Winner: Stewart. Duh.

Keith, stentorian wiseass and former sportscaster, is clearly a raving egomaniac. When his ire is directed outward at figures deserving of his scorn, it's incredibly watchable television. But you cannot ever escape the obvious fact that the man, admirable moral center or no, is a smug jerk in private and public life. Which is a plus in televised punditry, but it's exhausting.

Maddow, smart and cool, is now poised to make the most of an Obama presidency. She presents a perfect liberal alternative to a Bill O'Reilley or Sean Hannity: not because, like them, she's a bullying cheerleader for Obama and his party (that's a little more Olbermann), but because she's principled enough to fight for the Democrats when they're right and criticize them when they're wrong, without engaging in the partisan horseshit of official party mouthpieces like Carville and Begala. (This, by the way, is the important difference between the liberals of MSNBC and the liberals of CNN: Olbermann and Maddow are angry constituents, not party operatives.)

In other words, she's an idealized version of her theoretical audience (educated urban liberal), much like O'Reilley is a caricature of his own (enraged suburban/exurban male). And mark our words, we'll soon be seeing her on the front page of the Times Magazine or Newsweek as THE NEW FACE OF CABLE PUNDITRY and then will come the longer psychoanalytical think-pieces in New York and The New Yorker (she's slightly less suited for that Olbermann-profile treatment in Esquire but you never know). Which, it could be worse. We like her!

Plus, as the 2000s have taught us, Americans are totally willing to and love out lesbians on their televisions (thanks Ellen!) as long as they're not really annoying (sorry Rosie).

(And in the [totally likely!] event of a McCain presidency, Maddow might actually do even better, as advocate-y liberals always operate best in opposition—which is why they always undermine the Democrats so effectively.)

[Photo: dipdewdog]

Ailes' channel has been flagging over the past 12 months. Fox News is rapidly losing ground among the younger viewers most coveted by advertisers as MSNBC and CNN more cleverly exploit the presidential campaign season.

Ailes' utter failure, meanwhile, to control Fox News' snarling, smearing attack-dog PR department has been an embarrassment to his boss Rupert Murdoch, who has apparently resorted to trying to appease the once-despised Times with scoops to clean up the mess.

Ailes' bonus is a dumb use of News Corporation's money, which perhaps makes it slightly less of a weeping tragedy for lefties.

[Silicon Alley Insider]

• John Mayer dumped Jennifer Aniston after the actress pushed him for "a timetable" and to promise not to tour so much when they eventually make babies together. (Sounds clingy.) There was a trial split first. Aniston was said "furious" initially but now is pretending that she's "already dating someone else in LA."
• Keith Olbermann is not so sure MSNBC should be teaming up with Rupert Murdoch on some stupid "citizen journalism" project involving MySpace, so in retaliation the Post ran the absolute fattest, least attractive picture of the Countdown anchor it could find. [P6]
• Jeffrey Epstein has been visited in prison by the 29-year-old woman who used to find him "willing young women," and also the 23-year-old he once supposedly dubbed his "Yugoslavian sex slave." [P6]
• Samantha Ronson, 31, on Lindsay Lohan: "She's great. She's also 22 years old." [E!]
• Britney Spears doesn't want her kids to go into show business, and her Dad says Kevin Federline's "heart is right." [Scoop]
• Shelley Malil, who co-starred in the movie 40-Year-Old-Virgin, is suspected of having stabbed his ex-girlfriend 20 times. [LA Times]
• Some British boutique made an ad featuring a fur coat draped over a woman wearing a Stella McCartney bra. Stella's kind of a big time animal-rights activist who detests fur coats. Hilarity ensues, LOL. [P6]

[via Videogum]

[Via Chicaboomer]

They saw an opportunity years ago to create an ideological channel. And they did. I give them total credit. I tip my hat to them. They scored. But it was ideological and opportunistic. It was a business plan.

"We didn't do that. We go out and hire the best people that we can and give them freedom. Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann were arguing in point-of-view programs against the war when the war was popular. This wasn't a business decision. .... We're not tied to ideology the way they are. We're still NBC News, best newsgathering organization in the world, we have a couple of point-of-view people, but we have a variety of opinions you don't see elsewhere.

"But we're more fun. We're more interesting. We're smarter. We don't talk down to the audience...

I don't care if Obama wins or McCain wins, because I know we're in such a strong position we're going to continue to have success with whatever administration goes in there in 2009. I think they care."

So, in summary, MSNBC is different from Fox News because, while it has opinionated shows, there is no one opinion that pervades the network. Also, MSNBC is smarter and more fun, and also way hotter in a bikini, and more popular with the cool kids. Also, more mature. Better dresser.

But what's this about Fox deploying opinion as part of a "business plan?" So MSNBC is the one cable news network that acts independent of the ratings? The fact that Olbermann's "special comments" spiked viewership had nothing to do with that they got more frequent, and longer? Right.

In any case, something tells me a certain person is going to start appearing in Page Six a lot more often. And MSNBC may get a lot more interesting!

[Kansas City Star]

Olbermann called Snow "optimistic, funny and courageous," adding, "While we could not have disagreed more on policy, we were in frequent contact, even during his days as Press Secretary."

The temerity!

...a true friend of Snow's says Olbermann had "no relationship with Tony, at all." In fact, Olbermann named Snow his "Worst Person in the World" on Jan. 9, 2007, accusing him of lying about President Bush's 2003 "mission accomplished" speech. Olbermann hissed, "You're just baldfaced lying. You were hired to lie . . . We're not all third-graders out here."

Clearly, Olbermann's parting words for Snow should have focused on their bitterest moments of disagreement rather than on what Olbermann admired about Snow. In fact, Olbermann should have included in his eulogy the phrase "worst person in the world," if only for the sake of consistency.

[Post]

According to an insider, Keith was really upset that NBC didn't buy him a first-class ticket to Washington DC for Russert's private service. He was screaming into his phone demanding a first-class train ticket. Then he didn't get to go to the ceremony and he had to travel by car.

AND an "aghast witness" says Keith "went apoplectic" when he realized that there weren't any ketchup packets at the Kennedy Center. This is one of the weirdest gossip item we've ever read!

Olbermann was heard saying outside the service, "this place is going to hell," because his Washington staff couldn't find ketchup packets for lunch at the Center. An NBC insider claimed, however, "Keith did not have lunch at the Kennedy Center and was not eating on the set because he was anchoring a broadcast."

Honestly... the "insider" claiming to see a celeb berating an underling on a cell phone stories are kind of the lamest thing Page Six does. Nine times out of ten they are just obvious strikes against targets deemed unfriendly to the column. The story, while exclusive, is not even as entertaining as the one where they said Keith has a GIRL DISEASE. So if this is the worst they could do (WHERE IS HIS GODDAMN KETCHUP?) then Keith can probably rest easy.

He won't, though! He'll declare someone else tangentially involved the Worst Person In the World again and the cycle will begin anew.

Update: So Olbermann did mention this item on yesterday's show, by calling Page Six staffer Corynne Steindler the third-worst person in the world. Once again, further down the totem pole! A couple months from now he'll be accusing copy editors of smearing him. (Also there was a bit of an implied insult aimed at Corynne's photo, something Keith often claims to be above. And something Page Six never claims to be above.)

May 2003. This, according to Jack Shafer, is when Keith Olbermann instigated the NBC/Fox War. In a throwaway wisecrack at the close of his show, Olbermann compared Fox Blowhard Mascot Bill O'Reilly to Joe McCarthy. By 2006, the two hosts were fighting with each other almost nightly.

January 2006 Bill devotes his nightly comment to attacking NBC itself—and not Olbermann by name. "But 'Talking Points' is troubled by the behavior of NBC, which cheap shots FOX News on a regular basis and has been doing so for some time." He then takes it to the next level by going over Keith's head and pinning the blame on NBC President Robert Wright! (Keith responded by declaring O'Reilly his Worst Person in the World.)

October 2006 Fox's NBC war was expanding beyond Olbermann and O'Reilly. Fox gossip Roger Friedman turned a benefit report into an odd swipe at NBC's ratings, blaming Wright for the failure of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.

January 2007 The O'Reilly Factor presented a fair and balanced report on The Decline of NBC News. "As we reported NBC News has taken a sharp turn to the left under executive Jeff Zucker and Robert Wright with elements at NBC News now actually using propaganda from far left web sites as primary source material. Unbelievable." He went on to gleefully report on the supposed misdoings of Maria Bartiromo, bringing in a financial analyst willing to publicly trash CNBC.

April 2007 As the odious Michelle Malkin hosted his program, O'Reilly appeared via satellite to blame the Don Imus affair on Jeff Zucker. Meanwhile, Fox business correspondent Terry Keenan gleefully reported that NBC's parent company GE wanted to unload the network.

January 2008 The war heats up! O'Reilly does one of his patented ambushes of General Electric head Jeffrey Immelt! Supposedly because of some deal with Iran, but mainly because GE owns NBC and NBC employs Keith Olbermann and Keith Olbermann makes fun of Bill O'Reilly.

And so the feud widened. From Bill versus Keith to Fox versus NBC to News Corp versus General Electric. It went as high as Immelt and Rupert Murdoch! Fox News head Roger Ailes called NBC head Jeff Zucker personally to complain about Olbermann and threaten to take the battle to the New York Post. Murdoch called Zucker to ask that the network not play a video of a blogger harassing O'Reilly.

Page Six, the Post's gossip arm, constantly runs embarrassing stories about Olbermann. Which often leads to Olbermann naming some News Corp or Post-related figure his Worst Person in the World. And then the cycle begins anew! Over and over again!

Post columnist Andrea Peyser overhears Keith bitching about Connie Chung, Keith calls Peyser the worst person in the world, a few months later, Page Six reports that Olbermann is bad in bed! Then column editor Richard Johnson gets the first of his Worst Person in the World awards. (The second would come when he threatened to rape Vanessa Grigoriadis.) It's fun!

But the involvement of Murdoch? The harassment of Immelt? As GE decides whether it wants to keep its toes in the broadcasting business, this ego-driven bullshit might help convince them it's not worth it. Bill might win this one, sort of!

As in most things Murdochian, Rupert doesn't dirty his hands. While it's fun to pretend to see his fingerprints on each Olbermann smear in Page Six, the truth is Johnson and Post head Col Allen do indeed call the shots. They just know which shots they're supposed to call. Just like Roger Ailes at Fox, all the way down to Bill.

Would that GE and NBC/Universal had a message machine so in tune? They've got the cable blowhards warring with the broadcast newsmen and it all ends up publicized by one News Corp outlet or another.

The real winners, as always: us!

The insider said, "They're cable. They're far too partisan. They have no gravitas. If gravitas is eight letters, they're about seven letters short."

Even more than the opinionated Matthews, Olbermann, with his long "special comments," has forced open a wedge at NBC News between the cable and broadcast side. (The division was explored, among other places, in this week's New Yorker profile of Olbermann.) It appears as though Meet The Press is the latest battlefield in this civil war, which in turn implies that, though Olbermann lashed out at longtime enemies Murdoch and Page Six over the Russert memorial gossip, the stories may very well have originated not with anyone from News Corp. but from a fellow denizen of 30 Rock, the NBC headquarters.

[Post, Previously]

Update: So the Post has posted the Page Six item Keith Olbermann was so worked up about yesterday, and it does indeed say Hardball host Chris Matthews "seemed" to be talking about a strategy for landing Tim Russert's job at a memorial event for the NBC personality, and that Olbermann is threatening to quit if he doesn't get Russert's Meet The Press job. (On Countdown, Olbermann denied issuing an ultimatum for Meet The Press and said Matthews shut down talk of him replacing Russert when an acquaintance brought it up.) But the gossip item also quotes a source, ostensibly from the traditional broadcast side of NBC News, who claims that Russert himself wanted NBC News political director Chuck Todd as his own replacement, and that the network will never install someone from MSNBC on the show. The insider said, "They're cable. They're far too partisan. They have no gravitas. If gravitas is eight letters, they're about seven letters short."

Even more than the opinionated Matthews, Olbermann, with his long "special comments," has forced open a wedge at NBC News between the cable and broadcast side. (The division was explored, among other places, in this week's New Yorker profile of Olbermann.) It appears as though Meet The Press is the latest battlefield in this civil war, which in turn implies that, though Olbermann lashed out at longtime enemies Murdoch and Page Six over the Russert memorial gossip, the stories may very well have originated not with anyone from News Corp. but from a fellow denizen of 30 Rock, the NBC headquarters.

Update: Paula Froelich of Page Six responds: "I am honored and chuffed that someone with such a severe case of malignant self-obsession as Keith Olbermann would say I am the Worst Person in the World for June 19, 2008. Apparently I, by writing a true story about his ambitions, trumped the atrocities committed by Robert Mugabe, Than Swe, Boris Boyarskov (he wasn't in the news yesterday but I generally think he's a pretty bad guy and assume he did something bad), Ratko Mladic, Hugo Chavez, and his own beloved Dick Cheney. (Notice I didn't say what these people do — Olbermann will have to expand his scope beyond his own being to figure it out. Heres a hint, darling: one is the vice-president of the United States of America). Perhaps Keith, who is as infantile as he is narcissistic, should preach to his viewers about things that actually matter to them, rather than himself. But then again, there are only 300,000 of them. The FLDS has more members."

• Observers note that Arianna Huffington waited several days to personally blog anything about the death of Tim Russert of Meet The Press, who she often criticized. Then when she did say something, she didn't really praise the man. Not even faint praise! Dammit, Arianna, the public DEMANDS DISINGENUOUS EULOGIES! [R&M]
• Condé Nast is accused of stiffing the widow of advertising rainmaker Steve Florio by not handing over her husband's full severance, insurance and benefits. [P6]
• "Oh, hey, you know what would be romantic, clingy Jennifer Aniston?" "What, manorexic John Mayer?" "A stay at the Mexico vacation home of Girls Gone Wild founder Joe Francis, who served jail time for filming naked underaged girls! He just asks that we not disturb any evidence!" "Yaaay!" (Sorry, it's a lot better with the puppets.)
• This picture of movie Harry Potter is seriously the most frightening thing I've seen all night. Oh, also, he's buying a butt exerciser for some kind of Broadway role (picture does not involve his butt). [R&M]
• Britney Spears took a topless swim at a tops-optional Las Vegas pool lounge. None of the paparazzi got any shots, except of Spears in a skimpy outfit, and now Spears is said to be hawking her own topless photos from the swim. Or, well, technically her father runs her business affairs now by court order so... Ew.
• Lindsay Lohan has been "amazing" on the set of her movie, which means she's not getting drunk or high or passing out or committing felonies during working hours. Well, sure, but it's summertime. There aren't any nice coats lying around to steal. [People]
• Denise Richards admits to having 10 dogs. Sure they're on a ranch, but... why? "I am not sure why there is so much drama about how many animals I have," she said. Also: after she split with Charlie Sheen, Richards totally stole Heather Locklear's man, while they were friends. But on her reality show, she says they totally weren't friends any more, for three months. [P6]

• As a 23-year-old sportscaster, told a father of the instant reply he "didn't know anything about television sports," as the New Yorker puts it.
• Told his UPI supervisors, "God damn it, this is the minor leagues here, and it's things like this that are keeping us the minor leagues." Olbermann was fired that afternoon.
• Fought a "continuing pitched battle," as he described it, at CNN.
• At ESPN, caused his co-anchor to "lock herself in the bathroom and cry."
• Another ESPN colleague said, "he didn't burn bridges here — he napalmed them."

And some of the unflattering things said about Olbermann:

• A CNN colleague of Olbermann nearly torpedoed his MSNBC gig by revealing CNN focus groups did not like Olbermann.
• NBC News colleague Tim Russert distanced himself from Russert just before his passing, telling the magazine, "What cable emphasizes, more and more, is opinion, or even advocacy. Whether it’s Bill O’Reilly or Keith Olbermann or Lou Dobbs, that’s what that particular platform or venue does. It’s not what I do."
• Former NBC Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw: "It's a strain... [MSNBC host Chris Matthews' statement about Hillary Clinton owing her political career to her husband's cheating] was completely out of line. And Keith took it to another level" with a commentary telling President Bush to "shut the hell up."
• MSNBC chief Phil Griffin is supportive of Olbemann in the profile, but said the following about the reaction of Hillary Clinton supporters and former Countdown viewers to Olbermann's primary coverage of Clinton: "It was, like, you meet a guy and you fall in love with him, and he’s funny and he’s clever and he’s witty, and he’s all these great things, and then you commit yourself to him, and he turns out to be a jerk and difficult and brutal."

For all the insults and ups and downs of his career, Olbermann is having the last laugh, because NBC News covets the ratings he brings to third-place cable news network MSNBC — and it's precisely Olbermann's difficult, coarse personality that helped boost those ratings. His viewership rose 75 percent after he started doing his "special comment" editorials. "I think we're on to something" said Olbermann's boss' boss, NBC News president Steve Capus.

[New Yorker]

"Olbermann is uncoordinated—he can't drive, having once smashed his swollen head leaping into a subway car. The concussion permanently upset his equilibrium, he claims.

"The New Yorker also reveals that CBS was so desperate to find a replacement for Dan Rather, it nearly stooped to hiring Olbermann. CBS president Les Moonves and his news chief, Andrew Heywood, held a 'secret meeting' with Olbermann, where he said he wanted to 'redirect' the last three minutes of each newscast with 'his personal touch.' After a second meeting, the CBS suits picked Katie Couric instead.

"It was a major relief to old-school news vets. 'Oh, no, no, no, [Olbermann]'s not a newsman. He's not a reporter. I've never seen anything that he's done that was original in terms of information. It's all derivative,' said Sandy Socolow, who was Walter Cronkite's final executive producer.

"Tom Brokaw, who's had to give Olbermann on-air scoldings for his leftist grandstanding, told The New Yorker: 'Listen, it's a strain. And it's under constant examination.' But Olbermann actually thinks he'd rock in a nightly news slot, boasting, 'I think it would not do any worse than the three that are out there now.' [P6]

(Thanks to RavingRabbid and Anthony for the tips.)

Olbermann has been criticizing O'Reilly on his show for four years, including naming him the "worst person in the world" and saying his kids have a home life as difficult as that faced by the forthcoming child of a pregnant, transgendered man.

Instead of taking what he dishes out nightly, O'Reilly allowed News Corp. chairman Murdoch and Fox News chief Roger Ailes to complain to NBC executives on his behalf, asking that Olbermann be reined in. NBC refused, and O'Reilly launched a campaign on his show against NBC corporate parent General Electric and its CEO Jeffrey Immelt, saying that GE's business with Iran — "mostly... sales of oil, gas and energy and health-care equipment," according to the Washington Post — endangered American troops in Iraq.

News Corp. then offered to end the attacks in exchange for Olbermann backing off O'Reilly, according to NBC.

The Washington Post said Ailes threatened to deploy the New York Post against Olbermann, but an Ailes spokesman denied this, saying, "Roger doesn't control the editorial policy of the New York Post."

Within a few hours of that denial going online, the New York Post published its initial attack on Olbermann on its website.

That Murdoch properties do one another's dirty work and then lie about their actions is hardly surprising; but one would hope thinned-skinned rageaholic O'Reilly would learn to fight his own battles at some point instead of complaining to his bosses and permitting a sucker punch from Page Six, as though he doesn't have enough media firepower at his disposal on the O'Reilly Factor.

[Page Six, Washington Post]

The Daily Show covered this the other night. Skip to about three minutes in, when the pundits demand blood. "Look, we gotta kill her off—y'know, figuratively."

Sklar says: "To the fellow (male) journo I wrote to about this yesterday, who waved it off as just some colorful film-noir imagery, I say: can you IMAGINE if someone had said that about Obama?" Well we need imagine no more! Lovable old Pat Buchanan does do this in the clip above, when he mentions how often Hillary Clinton has "whipped" Obama. What a colorful image, a white lady repeatedly whipping a black man! But it's Pat Buchanan, no one even notices when he's casually racist anymore. (And obviously most of the grosser comments in the clip are directed at or about Senator Clinton.)

Cable news idiots just love violent imagery, they depend on it to make their miserable analyses sound exciting, and they're being utterly clueless when they use this imagery against Hillary Clinton. Which, once again, reinforcing misogyny. So shame on Olbermann!

Anyway, now you get to have a big comments fight about it!