The Atlanta Journal Constitution’s Bill Torpy writes about FNC, CNN, and MSNBC battling it out over election viewers. Torpy also manages to compare the CNN Election Center to a PBS Fund Raising Telethon…

An ebullient Jonathan Klein, president of CNN/US, couldn’t resist a dig. “Fox almost seems downright despondent in their coverage,” he told The New York Times after CNN beat Fox News the night of Jan. 8 — 3.29 million viewers to 3.06 million. CNN’s ratings had doubled from the same time in 2004.

But then last week, Fox News was crowing it had “continued its six-year reign as the most-watched cable news channel during the month of January, beating the competition in both total day and prime time viewership, according to Nielsen Media Research.”

CNN gets “spikes [in viewership] but they fall off quickly,” Fox News spokesman Richard White said. “Retention is what matters.”

He provided charts entitled: “CNN Sees No Bounce From January 2008 Election Coverage.”

Phil Griffin heads up the perennially third-ranked MSNBC. But he’s not sounding like an also-ran.

“Our coverage has been exceptional,” he said. “We have better reporters, better analysts, better journalists. The good news is our [viewership] shares have been growing.”

Viewer interest in the competitive, historic and rollicking presidential primaries are a rising tide lifting all cable news boats.