I’ve been vexxed by this TVNewser “insider quote” regarding E.D. Hill…

E.D. lost a lot of respect from the newsroom and the crew in the last few years. She’s been mailing it in for quite some time

On its face, this “don’t let the door hit you on the way out” type quip is designed to throw E.D. under the FNC bus. But the problem I have with it is that it doesn’t make any sense given her new role. If E.D. was really not pulling her weight and lost respect in the newsroom, then why is she being kept on in such a prominent role? You don’t keep someone on staff who isn’t doing the job, you get rid of them. CNN tried to demote Bill Hemmer off of American Morning into a minor role and Hemmer walked. CNN ate a large chunk of Aaron Brown’s contract rather than retain him in some role on the network (note: I’m not suggesting Brown was a drain on CNN, just that CNN would rather have eaten his contract rather than keep him on the air). MSNBC’s treatment of Ashleigh Banfield when the network soured on her is another example of how to get rid of a “problem”. FNC put out a release making note of Hill’s strengths for her new role; hardly a vote of no confidence by any means. So I just don’t buy the argument E.D. Hill was a problem for Fox and Friends.

MediaWeek’s Anthony Crupi writes about today’s big FNC news…

Hill had been a fixture on Fox & Friends since 1999. Prior to joining FNC the previous year, Hill served as a contributing reporter for ABC News’ Good Morning America and as an anchor/reporter for the broadcaster’s flagship, WABC-TV, New York.

Throughout the last several months, FNC has touted Fox & Friends as a viable alternative to morning broadcast shows like NBC’s Today and ABC’s Good Morning America. According to Nielsen Media Research, last month F&F averaged around 872,000 total viewers in its 6:00 a.m.-9:00 a.m time slot, an increase of 6 percent versus August 2005. It also grew its share of the core A25-54 demo by 11 percent, to 367,000.

Cable News Ratings for September 21, 2006

P2+ Total Day
FNC - 921,000 viewers
CNN - 494,000 viewers
MSNBC - 279,000 viewers
CNBC - 149,000 viewers
HLN - 251,000 viewers

P2+ Prime Time
FNC - 1,676,000 viewers
CNN - 774,000 viewers
MSNBC - 452,000 viewers
CNBC - 119,000 viewers
HLN - 463,000 viewers

25-54 Total Day
FNC - 296,000 viewers
CNN - 194,000 viewers
MSNBC - 118,000 viewers
CNBC - a scratch with 48,000 viewers
HLN - 110,000 viewers

25-54 Prime Time
FNC - 428,000 viewers
CNN - 280,000 viewers
MSNBC - 170,000 viewers
CNBC - a scratch with 42,000 viewers
HLN - 178,000 viewers
(more…)

FNC’s Catherine Herridge will be reporting on “The Quantico Letter” and how it implicated Dr. Ayaad Assad, a former Army scientist. Assad was cleared of any wrongdoing in the case and says the letter was an attempt to frame him. Herridge’s report will air tonight on Special Report with Brit Hume….

Following up on this item from yesterday on the company that paid another company to be featured on Headline News, CJR Daily’s Paul McCleary takes up the story and tries to get a comment from CNN and fails. McLeary makes some points I hadn’t considered yesterday when I was criticizing The Cable Game’s characterization of the story. And McLeary does a little digging and finds that there’s more to the story…

Doing a Google search of “Pulse on America” and “CNN” turns up all manner of press releases from companies “selected” by Platinum to be featured on “Pulse on America.” What the press releases don’t say, however, is that after having been “selected,” they presumably had to pay a large “licensing fee” in order to get their message out to CNN viewers, who think they’re watching a straight news segment.

It’s time that CNN come clean on this practice, and let viewers know what it is they’re watching: content that has been bought and paid for by interested parties that presents itself as news, but is anything but.

ICN has learned that Gretchen Carlson will replace E.D. Hill on Fox & Friends beginning this Monday, September 25th.

UPDATE: Here is the release…

FOX News Channel (FNC) today named Gretchen Carlson anchor and co-host of the network’s signature morning program FOX & Friends (7-9AM/EST), announced Bill Shine, Senior Vice President of Programming. Carlson joins co-hosts Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade beginning Monday, September 25th.

In making the announcement Shine said, “Gretchen’s warm personality and dynamic energy is a perfect fit for FOX & Friends.”
(more…)

Johnny Dollar has a montage from Dayside’s last day on the air…

ICN has learned that E.D. Hill is moving to the 10am ET hour of Fox News Live . She will do first half hour from 10-10:30am with Jon Scott, will anchor 10:30-11:30am alone, and will anchor 11:30am-12pm with Bill Hemmer. Hill is replacing Brigitte Quinn who had the exact same schedule.

UPDATE: Here’s FNC’s release announcing the move…

FOX News Channel (FNC) today named E.D. Hill a new member of the FOX News Live anchor team, announced Bill Shine, Senior Vice President of Programming. Hill will anchor FOX News Live from 10 AM-12PM/EST beginning Monday, September 25th.

In making the announcement Shine said, “E.D.’s versatility and strength in anchoring in-depth and breaking news stories will be a powerful addition to the FOX News Live team.”
(more…)

Marketwatch’s Jon Friedman has a profile of CNN’s Faith and Values correspondent Delia Gallagher…

CNN’s decision to hire a religion reporter coincides with what appears to be a movement among the U.S. media. Newsweek devoted many covers in the past few years to religious subjects. And Time’s cover piece recently asked: Does God Want You to Be Rich?

Jonathan Klein, president of CNN/U.S., said of religion: “It’s a category that’s underrepresented in television and in journalism.”

Klein added: When Pope John Paul II died last year, “Delia was our Vatican analyst. She did such a thorough job and was so poised and encyclopedic, it just clicked that this is the perfect match for a person we had a need for.”

Cliff Kincaid in the National Ledger wonders what happened to Joe Scarborough…

There used to be a time when Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC’s Scarborough Country, considered himself-and was considered-a conservative. He was a presenter at the 2004 Media Research Center (MRC) Dishonors Awards, which “honors” the most blatant and biased examples of distorted liberal reporting at a dinner that includes hilarious clips of the offending statements. Recently, however, Scarborough put himself up for a nomination, as he devoted his show to the question, “Is Bush an Idiot?,” and won the plaudits of the Washington Post and the left-wing bloggers at Mother Jones.

I say to my friends at the MRC, who have been kind enough to include me as a judge of those awards for many years now, that Scarborough should be “honored” at the next dinner for his pathetic excuse of a program. It is obvious that Scarborough, like his associate Keith Olbermann, has decided that he needs to increase his audience by appealing to the anti-Bush fringe.

The producers at the ratings-starved Scarborough show hit on the perfect theme guaranteed to make one famous in the liberal press. But Scarborough is the one who came across looking like a buffoon, if not an idiot.

The Philadelphia Daily News’ Howard Gensler writes about the Al-Qaeda “Death List” bruhaha…

IT’S NICE to see radaronline.com back spinning out quirky, investigative news items, including this one on Bill O’Reilly.

The pompous pundit recently told Barbara Walters in a “20/20″ interview that “the FBI came in and warned me and a few other people at Fox News that al Qaeda had us on a death list.”

(Actually it wasn’t al Qaeda, but Keith Olberman.)

Now the no-spin-meister may have some spinnin’ to do:

“I’ve never heard that before,” a Fox News correspondent told Radar. “I do know the government has warned Fox about threats in the past, but I don’t think they involved specific people.”

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Tim Cuprisin has a profile of FNC’s Jane Skinner…

It’s hard to believe that Jane Skinner left the anchor desk at Channel 6 nine years ago.

And after eight years of reporting and anchoring at Fox News Channel, she’s finally earned an hour of her own, starting Monday, when she debuts in the 1 p.m. slot.

Fox News is shuffling its lunchtime schedule, since “DaySide” hosts Juliet Huddy and Mike Jerrick are moving to a new morning show on the Fox broadcast network next year.

“It’s a little bit of pressure,” Skinner tells Inside TV & Radio. “The hour makes sense to me - and obviously made sense on the boss level. I’m coming right before Shepard.”