The Las Vegas Review-Journal’s Molly Ball writes about the effort afoot to get the Nevada Democratic Party to give FNC the boot on covering a Presidential candidate debate there…

State party Chairman Tom Collins sent a lengthy e-mail to members Friday evening seeking to assuage their concerns.

“Believe me, I am all too aware of the challenges associated with Fox,” Collins wrote. “And this is not an endorsement of Fox.”

The party “got, in writing, a number of concessions” from the channel to ensure the debate broadcast was fair, Collins said. “You may not agree with us, but trust that this is not a sell-out or a cave-in to the lures of Fox. This is how we will win over new voters.”

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean, once the darling of the lefty blogosphere, wasn’t taking its side on the issue either. He told the San Francisco Chronicle, “While the Fox News Channel rarely has coverage that is fair and balanced, we believe that Fox viewers, who are potential voters, should have the opportunity to see a debate between our candidates. These forums provide an important unfiltered opportunity for potential voters to see Democrats without the bias of the network.”

Today on CNBC during Closing Bell, Maria Bartiromo and Dylan Ratigan interviewed former Citigroup Chairman and CEO Sanford Weill about Citigroup personel moves and the company’s philanthropy. Part one can be viewed here. Part 2 here. Some people are going to point to the recent Citigroup scandal involving Bartiromo and wonder why on earth she’s anywhere near this interview. Others will point out that the interview wasn’t with anyone who currently works at CNBC as Weill is no longer Chairman and CEO and therefore there’s nothing wrong with it. What do you think?

The Hollywood Reporter’s Andrew Wallenstein sarcastically writes about FNC going the comedy route in an illogical extreme. I’m on record about not being a fan of cable news doing straight comedy but this is just plain silly…

Expect a smooth transition from news to entertainment at FNC. Viewers love it when cable channels abandon their core programming format, like that time MTV dropped all those pesky music videos. Not one complaint.

Comedy on a news channel — it’s about time. How much longer were we expected to endure a news channel consisting strictly of news, anyway? It’s not like there’s much to cover out there, except for the Iraq War, the 2008 presidential campaign, yada yada. It’s the perfect evolution for a channel that has always put entertainment values ahead of anything else.

Cable News Daily Ratings for February 23, 2007

P2+ Total Day
FNC – 868,000 viewers
CNN – 494,000 viewers
MSNBC – 320,000 viewers
CNBC – 167,000 viewers
HLN – 282,000 viewers

P2+ Prime Time
FNC – 1,634,000 viewers
CNN – 824,000 viewers
MSNBC – 346,000 viewers
CNBC – 127,000 viewers
HLN – 473,000 viewers

25-54 Total Day
FNC – 257,000 viewers
CNN – 171,000 viewers
MSNBC – 138,000 viewers
CNBC – 65,000 viewers
HLN – 134,000 viewers

25-54 Prime Time
FNC – 362,000 viewers
CNN – 244,000 viewers
MSNBC – 132,000 viewers
CNBC – a scratch with 45,000 viewers
HLN – 200,000 viewers

Morning programs P2+ (25-54)
FOX & Friends – 791,000 viewers (351,000)
American Morning – 435,000 viewers (179,000)
Imus in the Morning– 420,000 viewers (191,000)
Robin & Co. – 218,000 viewers (149,000)
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MSNBC.com announced this morning the launch of a new tool (which in fact was launched earlier in the month) to allow viewers to submit photos, videos, and stories…

MSNBC.com has launched FirstPerson, a tool for readers to upload their photos, videos and stories. Editors screen and publish user submissions in a unique gallery format, and users can vote for their favorites and view pictures and video by the most popular and editors’ choices.

“Our readers’ voices and experiences add depth and context to the stories we tell every day,” said Jennifer Sizemore, editor in chief of MSNBC.com. “With FirstPerson, we have a one-of-a-kind way for our users to participate in the news and features that are most interesting to them.”

The response to FirstPerson, which launched this month, has been overwhelming. During the “NBC Nightly News” series “Trading Places: Caring for Your Parents,” MSNBC.com users submitted more than 6,000 stories, photos and videos of their experiences caring for their aging parents. See those submissions at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17049721/.
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CNN’s Heidi Collins interviewed that son of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani this morning on CNN Newsroom. Transcript follows…

HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: We want to get back to the story we’ve been telling you about this morning, the condition of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani. A little bit of confusion here coming from Amman, Jordan, where he was taken, and is now. We are hearing from some physicians that apparently he has been transferred to the intensive care unit and that the doctors are telling us a catheter has been inserted into his heart. You may have heard our correspondent on the ground there in Amman, Jordan, Jennifer Eccleston, saying the same thing.

However, we are learning from — according to the Associated Press anyway, that the private doctor and the spokesman of Jalal Talabani are denying those reports that he’s been moved to intensive care in that Jordanian hospital. It’s the King Hussein Medical Center.

So what we want to do bring on Jalal Talabani’s son. This is Qubad Talabani. He is joining us now by telephone from Washington D.C. Mr. Talabani, can you clear this up for us?
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CNN announced that CNN Radio will be doing a one hour special hosted by Erica Hill on the Adult Entertainment Industry…

CNN Radio puts a spotlight on America’s public fascination with pornography in a special one-hour program hosted by Headline News anchor Erica Hill. “For Adults Only?” will examine the adult entertainment industry as a whole, its future, the companies that profit from it and the effects pornography has on people, their relationships and the local community.

“For Adults Only?” airs Tuesday, Feb. 20, from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. (ET) CNN Radio supervising producer John Lisk produced the program.

For the special, Hill will interview several guests including husband and wife acting team, Tera Patrick and Evan Seinfeld aka “Spyder Jonez”; Paul Fishbein, publisher of Adult Video News; Steven Hirsch, co-founder of Vivid Entertainment, the largest maker of adult films in the world; and sex therapist Dr. Marty Klein.
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Mutlichannel News’ Linda Haugsted writes about Fox and Friends holding a sweepstakes to have a viewer appear on the show.

When the network first executed a similar promotion last year, it attracted nearly 400,000 entries, 200,000 of which were unique views of the channel’s Web site, according to senior vice president of affiliate sales Tim Carry.

Operators in 145 local systems serving 22 million households signed up to support the effort last year, he said.

This year, affiliates serving 24.5 million subscribers have agreed to locally promote the sweepstakes.

To participate, cable systems must agree to schedule a minimum of 350 promotional spots during a three-week period. Those spots are placed in the networks that rate highest in the 25- to 55-year-old demographic, including CNN, ESPN, TBS, TNT, USA Network, Lifetime, Court TV, TLC and A&E Network.

WHAC has an interview with new CNN weekend anchor TJ Holmes…

Some tend to think that since you’re an anchor, that’s all you do … sit there and read the teleprompter for hours. What does the job of a CNN anchor entail?

I know people think of anchors as “reading the prompter”, but at CNN, a lot of our time on the news set is spent not reading, but ad-libbing. A lot of a CNN newscast is unscripted because breaking news happens or interviews are added, etc. Every CNN anchor also reports. We go out in the field. Of course, it’s not on a daily basis, like the field correspondents, but anchors do plenty of reporting.

Also, there are so many challenges and demands on CNN anchors that take you outside of the newsroom. We have responsibilities to the community.

Community groups and organizations often call on us to lend a hand in some way. We often serve as guest speakers, panelist or emcee events.

Many anchors serve on community boards as well.

CNN’s Jeff Koinange was robbed at gunpoint according to CNN Wire…(via CNN Observations)

Jeff Koinange, CNN’s Africa correspondent, and his wife were robbed at gunpoint on Saturday outside CNN’s office in the South African metropolis of Johannesburg.

Koinange said he had a gun pointed to his head while four armed young men stole everything he was carrying.

But he and his wife did not suffer injuries in what he called a “brazen” assault that occurred in broad daylight with people walking by and cars driving past.

TVWeek’s Marianne Paskowski writes about last week’s courtroom melodrama…

But perhaps more strange, given the big news of the day that Prime Minister Tony Blair would withdraw British troops from Iraq, was the decision by Fox News Channel and CNN Headline News to run the courtroom antics uninterrupted by commercials, with only a running crawl about what was happening on the rest of the planet.

CNN, by contrast, chose to cover all of the news, and I honestly forgot to check out what MSNBC was up to because I was too busy trying to figure out what was going on at the Smith hearing while simultaneously squinting to read the Fox News ticker at the bottom of the screen.

After all, the really bad stuff appears first on the ticker. On Fox it flew by so fast that I kept watching it over and over, seeing a reference about “terror alert elevated.” I watched the crawl repeat three times, but never learned where or why or if it ever happened.

The Street.com announced today that Jim Cramer has donated trading profits to the Imus Ranch…

TheStreet.com, Inc. (Nasdaq: TSCM), a leading provider of financial commentary, analysis, research, news and ratings, today announced that James J. Cramer, co-founder, director and largest shareholder of TheStreet.com, made the final distribution of his trading profits of 2006 from his charitable trust on February 9, 2007.

Mr. Cramer manages his Action Alerts PLUS portfolio as a charitable trust with the intention of distributing all realized gains to worthy charities. The Action Alerts PLUS service, which tracks Mr. Cramer’s actual investments in individual stocks, is intended to act as an educational tool with a focus on making money that the charitable trust can distribute.

The distribution for 2006 trading profits is $93,000, with the entire sum going to the Imus Ranch, a working cattle ranch, which benefits children who suffer from cancer and serious blood disorders or who have lost a sibling to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
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CNN announced today that Steve Kastenbaum joined its radio network…

Steve Kastenbaum has joined CNN Radio as a New York-based correspondent, it was announced today by Jerry DeMink, vice president, CNN News Services. Kastenbaum most recently worked as a news reporter with 1010 WINS Radio in New York City.

“Steve comes to the CNN Radio network with considerable broadcasting skills and an impressive slate of experience,” DeMink said. “We are thrilled to have him onboard, giving us and our partner stations top-notch reports from yet another exceptionally experienced CNN Radio journalist.”
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Johnny Dollar has some video snippets from the show’s premiere. What did you think of the program?