MSNBC’s Super Tuesday coverage plans…

The networks of NBC News – NBC, MSNBC, MSNBC.com, NBC 2 Go and NBC News Radio – will present continuing live coverage of the Super Tuesday primaries, when voters in 24 states cast their ballots in Democratic and Republican presidential primaries and caucuses.

“NBC Nightly News” anchor Brian Williams will lead the network coverage, joined by NBC Washington Bureau Chief and moderator of “Meet the Press” Tim Russert, with live coverage of election results on NBC, 10-11 p.m. ET. The special coverage will be live across all time zones. NBC News Special Correspondent Tom Brokaw will contribute analysis, with “Today” anchor Ann Curry reporting on exit polls. NBC News correspondents Andrea Mitchell, David Gregory, Kelly O’Donnell, Ron Allen, Lee Cowan and Kevin Corke will report from the campaigns across the country. NBC News will also present a special one-hour edition of “Nightly News,” which will be updated with election results across all time zones. In addition, Williams will also anchor network special reports throughout primetime as primary and caucus results are available.
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MSNBC’s Florida Republican Primary coverage plans…

Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann will anchor MSNBC’s special live coverage of the Florida Republican presidential primary Tuesday, Jan. 29, beginning at 6 p.m. ET.

MSNBC will continue live coverage all day, with Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski anchoring live from Orlando, Fla., NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell anchoring live from Washington D.C., and David Shuster anchoring live from Florida.

MSNBC’s primetime lineup begins with “Hardball with Chris Matthews,” live at 5 p.m. ET; Olbermann and Matthews will anchor live coverage of primary returns from MSNBC Election Headquarters in New York beginning at 6 p.m. ET, with NBC Nightly News Anchor and Managing Editor Brian Williams, NBC News Washington Bureau Chief and moderator of “Meet the Press” Tim Russert, and NBC News Special Correspondent Tom Brokaw joining to provide analysis, along with NBC News Political Director Chuck Todd and Newsweek’s Howard Fineman. Panelists will include Scarborough, MSNBC political analysts Rachel Maddow and Pat Buchanan, and Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post.
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CJR Daily’s Liz Cox Barrett writes about the media (MSNBC) and the Hillary Clinton surprise victory…

As my colleague Gal Beckerman observed earlier today, with last night’s New Hampshire victory, Hillary beat the press.

Meanwhile, the press spent some time last night beating itself.

Here is a sampling of the sort of mild self-flagellation on display last night on MBSNC (the channel I happened to be watching) where many of the network’s familiar faces-with the exception of Chris Matthews-seemed to be doing some form of soul-searching for having, as Tom Brokaw put it, prematurely and sometimes excitedly “end[ed] the Clinton era,” for having been so sure of New Hampshire’s outcome hours or even days before the polls closed. (Sounds familiar, no?) Often, it seemed to be Brokaw gently apologizing for his onetime peers. (Maybe that’s what gravitas means).

I’m going to step in here and weigh in a bit in defense of the media, and not just MSNBC, regarding what happened Tuesday. It’s easy to say “the Media got it wrong”. But “the Media” was basing its results on polling data that was nearly universally showing Obama with a major cushion going in to Tuesday’s vote.
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MSNBC’s coverage plans for the New Hampshire Primary…

Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann will anchor MSNBC’s live coverage of the New Hampshire presidential primary Tuesday, Jan. 8, 6 p.m.-1 a.m. MSNBC’s live primary coverage kicks off with a special edition of “Hardball with Chris Matthews” at 5 p.m. ET.

MSNBC’s New Hampshire coverage will include “Morning Joe,” live from New Hampshire, reports throughout the day from MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski, David Shuster and Tucker Carlson on the ground in New Hampshire and reports from NBC News correspondents Ron Allen, Kevin Corke, Lee Cowan, David Gregory, Andrea Mitchell, Kelly O’Donnell and John Yang. Olbermann and Matthews will anchor live coverage of primary returns from MSNBC Election Headquarters in New York beginning at 6 p.m. ET, with NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams and “Meet the Press” moderator and NBC News Washington bureau chief Tim Russert contributing from New Hampshire and panelists including Scarborough, Newsweek’s Howard Fineman, Eugene Robinson, of the Washington Post, Katrina vanden Heuvel of The Nation, MSNBC analyst Pat Buchanan and Rachel Maddow of Air America. Former NBC Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw will also appear to provide analysis. MSNBC Chief Washington Correspondent Norah O’Donnell will provide analysis of the latest exit polls and early returns.

MSNBC’s release on “Super Week” coverage 0f Iowa…

MSNBC presents special “Super Week” coverage of the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary, as the first ballots are cast in the 2008 presidential election campaign.

MSNBC will present continuing live coverage from Iowa and New Hampshire, with daily reports from correspondent David Shuster, on the ground in Iowa now. “Morning Joe” will telecast live from Iowa Thursday morning and live from New Hampshire on Friday, 6-9 a.m. ET. Tucker Carlson will anchor “Tucker” live from Iowa on Wednesday at 6 p.m. ET, and live from New Hampshire on Thursday and Friday with the John McCain campaign. On Thursday night, coverage of the caucuses continues with a special live “Hardball with Chris Matthews” at 7 p.m. ET and a special edition of “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” at 8 p.m. ET. Election results will be reported throughout the evening as they become available. Olbermann and Matthews will anchor live coverage of caucus results from MSNBC Election Headquarters in New York beginning at 9 p.m. ET, with NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams and “Meet the Press” moderator and NBC News Washington bureau chief Tim Russert contributing from Iowa and panelists including Pat Buchanan, Newsweek’s Howard Fineman, Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post and Rachel Maddow of Air America. Former NBC Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw will also appear to provide analysis. MSNBC Chief Washington Correspondent Norah O’Donnell will provide up-to-the-minute entrance polling analysis.
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Tom Browkaw will be Tim Russert’s guest this weekend on MSNBC’s Tim Russert program Saturday at Noon ET…

Tom Brokaw, former “NBC Nightly News” managing editor and anchor and current NBC News special contributor, will appear on this week’s edition of “Tim Russert.” Brokaw will discuss his new book, “Boom!: Voices of the Sixties Personal Reflections on the ’60s and Today.”

“Tim Russert” features interviews with the country’s most intriguing policymakers, authors, journalists and others, and provides in-depth discussions on politics, entertainment and the media.

Tim Russert is host of “Tim Russert.” Barbara Fant is the executive producer.

Johhny Dollar has the audio from this morning’s Brian and The Judge radio program where Tom Brokaw is prodded into talking about MSNBC, NBC, FNC, and Rosie O’Donnell. Also Brokaw announced that he would be on Hannity and Colmes for the first time, though he didn’t specify an air date…

Update: Brokaw will be on tonight on Hannity & Colmes…

Radar Magazine has put out a list of the most overrated people, places, and things. Two cable news personalities made the cut. This was excerpted from the print edition and is not available online.

ANDERSON COOPER

CNN’s Bambi-eyed anchor has been anointed the media’s next golden boy- a compassionate, handsome heir to Rather, Brokaw, and Jennings. But his numbers tell a different story. “If I stood at my window naked, I would have more viewers,” scoffs an insider (who notes that Coop draws an even smaller audience than Aaron Brown, the man he replaced). But because he looks so pretty on the cover of Vanity Fair, his flaccid numbers haven’t diminished his standing at CNN (or rumors of a Tom Ford-bottled, Cooper-inspired fragrance).

KEITH OLBERMANN

With his entertaining harangues against the Bush White House, Olbermann has positioned himself as the market beneficiary of liberal rage. But as Edward Murrow’s moral heir, he falls short. It’s impossible, for instance, to imagine Murrow boasting to a disagreeable viewer- as Olbermann did last year in a series of e-mails for which MSNBC brass ordered him to apologize- “By the way, with my new contract I could buy and sell you.” Or offering up such fine sentiments as “you couldn’t be stupider, wronger, or dumber if you were Ann Coulter’s cunt.” Stay classy, San Diego!

Dan Rather has been all over the cable news nets today. He was on MSNBC earlier today and on The Situation Room this evening. The Politico’s Anne Schroeder explains why…

“Dan Rather Available to Discuss Report Presenting Conclusive Evidence of Voting Machine Failures” is the e-mail subject line.

Would this ever happen to Tom Brokaw?

The Guardian’s Dan Kennedy opines on Paul Zahn and what it means for cable news…

It wasn’t always this way. Just a few years ago, CNN and MSNBC competed head-to-head with hour-long newscasts at 10pm - the aforementioned NewsNight, an engaging program defined by Brown’s quirky intelligence, versus Tom Brokaw’s earnestly serious replacement-in-waiting, Brian Williams. Since then, the success of Fox has clearly affected the competition. Opinion is cheaper than news, and apparently more popular, too. And it’s not just cable TV. After all, even the New York Times gives away its news online but charges for columnists.

The problem with all this opinion-mongering is that it contributes to cynicism about the news and the alleged biases of the folks who report it. If news is nothing but background noise that Bill O’Reilly can spin one way and Keith Olbermann another, then there is nothing we can point to other than baseball scores that is objectively true. Thus we have arrived at a point where even the horrors of, say, Abu Ghraib can be dismissed as little more than partisan sniping.

Which is why Paula Zahn’s critique is important. If the cable news channels can’t survive by bringing us, you know, news, then that’s a pretty sad commentary.

MSNBC put out a release for the final details for coverage of the first Democratic and Republican presidential candidate debates…

As previously announced, MSNBC will carry exclusive live national coverage of the first national presidential primary debates including the Democratic Candidates’ Debate on April 26, and the Republican Candidates’ Debate on May 3. NBC Nightly News Anchor and Managing Editor Brian Williams will moderate the South Carolina debate, which will originate from South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, South Carolina, from 7:00 to 8:30 pm (ET). Chris Matthews will moderate the Republican Candidates’ Debate, sponsored by MSNBC, The Reagan Library and Politico.com, originating from the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California from 8:00 to 9:30 pm (ET). Both debates will stream live on MSNBC.com.

As the Democratic candidates gather in South Carolina to debate the key issues facing their party and the nation, MSNBC anchors will be on hand to telecast live from the venue including Keith Olbermann, Chris Matthews, Joe Scarborough and Tucker Carlson. MSNBC will preview the debate throughout the day on April 26th with all-day political coverage beginning at 9:00 am (ET). Anchors throughout the day will include NBC’s David Gregory, Chip Reid and Peter Alexander, and MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough, Chris Jansing, Amy Robach and Norah O’Donnell. “Tucker” will telecast live at 4:00 pm (ET) from South Carolina State University. “Hardball with Chris Matthews” 5:00 pm (ET) will present a “Hardball College Tour” with special guests Elizabeth Edwards and the third highest-ranking democrat in the House of Representatives, Congressman Jim Clyburn (D-SC) before a student audience on the campus of South Carolina State University.
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The New York Times’ David Carr writes about the guests of Imus in the Morning continuing to appear after last week’s incident. This article was referenced this morning on the show when Tom Oliphant, who was interviewed for it, mentioned it.

Although the Web has been alive with calls for sanctions against Mr. Imus — the clip is available for all to see on YouTube — mainstream media have remained relatively silent. He is, after all, popular, good at his job and, perhaps more important, he generously provides oxygen — and an audience — to the kind of journalistic and political elites who would be expected to demand his head on a pike.

He is, to borrow one of the show’s metaphors, a lawn jockey to the establishment. Few politicians, big or small, pass up a chance to bump knees with Mr. Imus, in part because his show is one of the few places where they can talk seriously and at length about public issues. Senator John Kerry has stopped by. Senator John McCain is on frequently. And Senators Joseph I. Lieberman and Joseph R. Biden are part of a legion eager to sit in the guest chair.

NBC News uses “Imus in the Morning” to promote the brands of Tim Russert, Andrea Mitchell and David Gregory. Tom Brokaw was a frequent guest, and his replacement, Brian Williams, has been sanctified by the I-man, as they call him. Chris Matthews from MSNBC has appeared, as have anchors and journalists from CNN and CBS and, on the print side, by reporters and editors from Newsweek and popular opinion columnists from The New York Times.

“Whatever problem there was, I think that he took care of with his statement of Friday,” said Mr. Oliphant, one of the guests scheduled for this morning. “It was classic Imus. He said he screwed up and he was sorry. Bang. Bang. It was very much to the point, and did not offer any excuses.”

The RTNDA announced yesterday that Christianne Amanpour will receive the Paul White Award for an individual’s lifetime contribution to electronic journalism…

Christiane Amanpour, CNN’s chief international correspondent, has been named the 2007 recipient of the Paul White Award from the Radio-Television News Directors Association. RTNDA will honor Amanpour on April 16, 2007, at RTNDA@NAB in Las Vegas.

Amanpour has spent the past two decades traveling to some of the world’s most tumultuous regions, reporting on war, civil strife and natural disaster, and gaining unprecedented access to world leaders. From Iraq and Afghanistan to Somalia and Rwanda, Amanpour has created awareness of important world issues, most notably her extensive coverage of the interethnic conflicts in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
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The Orlando Sentinel’s Hal Boedeker blogs about the latest in the Bill O’Reilly vs OlbmernanMSNBCNBCNewsEngelBrokawScarboroughMatthewsCapusZuckerWrightBrewer fracas. Boedeker, however, undermines the story with his own anti-O’Reilly quips and zingers.

Scarborough played a clip from O’Reilly’s show. “What Richard Engel and Brian Williams did not report last night is that violence has dropped about 80 percent in Baghdad since the surge, according to the Army,” O’Reilly said. “Mr. Engel is a brave man but has consistently taken an anti-war position in general. That`s not what correspondents are supposed to do.”

Afterward, Scarborough said, “That’s just a lie. … The big question is, What`s Bill O`Reilly’s obsession with NBC? And has he gone too far this time by attacking a brave war correspondent from the safety of his Washington, D.C., studio?”

Of course, Scarborough had a vested interest in defending his employer. Still, he was making good points because O’Reilly needs to be called on the mistakes. O’Reilly loves to talk about Policing the Press. O’Reilly needs to be policed.

The Pew Research Center released a survey of the most admired journalists…

(Survey is in percentage)

5 Katie Couric
4 Bill O’Reilly
3 Charles Gibson
2 Dan Rather
2 Tom Brokaw
2 Brian Williams
2 Anderson Cooper
2 Jon Stewart
1 Jim Lehrer 100
1 Bob Woodruff
1 Peter Jennings
1 Walter Cronkite
1 Matt Lauer
1 Rush Limbaugh
1 Barbara Walters
1 Brit Hume
1 Diane Sawyer
1 Wolf Blitzer
1 Ted Koppel
1 Keith Olbermann
1 Lou Dobbs
1 Tim Russert
24 Other
44 None/Don’t know/Refused

Pew breaks down the results….
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With an article title guaranteed to send these guys into a tizzy, Rolling Stone’s Mark Binelli interviews Keith Olbermann…

Olbermann clearly relishes his feuds and doesn’t seem to worry much about sparking new ones. When I ask him why he thinks Katie Couric’s stint as CBS anchor isn’t working, he shoots back, “It’s simple. She’s not good at it.” (Asked if he’d take the gig himself, he says, “Of course. But I don’t think they’d ask me.” A few weeks later, MSNBC extended his contract for another four years and announced that he will contribute reports to NBC Nightly News.)

Last June, the Daily News printed e-mail exchanges between Olbermann and hostile viewers. The host advised one correspondent to “go fuck your mother” and another to “kill yourself.” He also told a fan that fellow MSNBC host Rita Cosby was “nice but dumber than a suitcase of rocks.” Though the e-mails were meant to embarrass Olbermann, they only served to underline what people already know and like about him. It’s hard to imagine Tom Brokaw even bothering to respond to an e-mail critic, let alone writing “you couldn’t be stupider, wronger or dumber,” but Olbermann’s status as a loose cannon is a large part of his appeal, and the sizable ego he brings to the table makes him the perfect foil for the likes of O’Reilly.

There’s also a companion piece, “The Top Five Rants of Keith Olbermann” with YouTube video of each rant…

Tonight on Countdown, Keith Olbermann gave Bill O’Reilly “Worst Person in the World” for putting former NBC Analyst Ken Allard on to talk about William Arkin. Video of the interview is here. Olbermann called O’Reilly a “swine”, apparently for putting Allard on the air. Allard left NBC News after 10 years, partly because he had a stroke.

This gets pretty complicated. Allard wrote a colum in the San Antonio Express News on the Arkin incident a couple of days ago. In the Express News Allard made some comments about NBC News which according to O’Reilly were cut out. It’s not clear to me where the cut was. The online column does contain some criticism about NBC News, so perhaps the edit was to the print edition (Allard suggested it was to save space, which you don’t need to do in an online column but might need to do in a print column). Here is Allard’s criticism from the online column…

But it is becoming increasingly apparent that Arkin won’t be fired despite having gone well beyond those bounds — and not for the first time. In 2003, for example, he tried to blacklist a decorated Green Beret general as a “Christian jihadist.” In 2005, he published an astonishing primer on deciphering American military code names and covert operations.

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Wednesday on Countdown, FNC’s Julie Banderas made the Worst Person in The World. FTVLive had video of the Banderas segment yesterday…

But the winner, correspondent Julie Banderas of Fox noise channel, appearing on Bill O’Reilly’s yuck fest last night as a guest expert on TV news. This is a woman who two years ago was covering toilets overflowing on the local newscast. She explained, “NBC has lost over two million viewers since Peter Jennings stepped down and then Tom Brokaw, his show has lost about, I don’t know, two million viewers.”

Actually Tom retired more than two years ago and the fall off since then has been, at worst, negligible. And Peter Jennings was on ABC, not NBC, and he passed away.

This makes Miss Banderas exactly the kind of expert Bill-O loves. Julie, does the red light mean the camera is on or off? Banderas, Wednesday’s Worst Person in the World.

Bill O’Reilly responded to MSNBC’s ad last night in the Most Ridiculous Item of the day. Video can be found here. The usual O’Reilly whipping posts, as far as NBCMSNBCOlbermannMatthewsBrokawWrightZucker are concerned, were trotted out so there’s nothing really new to report on though he did rub MSNBC’s and CNBC’s nose in the ratings mud.

On Monday night, for example, one of them averaged 172,000 households in prime time. — That’s like nobody. The other averaged 386,000, both dismal showings.

By comparison FOX News prime time household average was more than 1.5 million. And “The Factor” led everyone with more than 2 million homes, more than 2.6 million viewers at 8, another 1.3 million at 11. So you can see, you know, what the situation is about who is watching.

Ridiculous? Well, we just hope NBC News continues its insane policies. Come on. Keep attacking us, guys.

Setting aside the fact that O’Reilly picked a night for comparison when FNC was really strong (stronger than that more than 1.5 million number he gave) and the fact that O’Reilly’s numbers for MSNBC and CNBC don’t match the higher numbers I have for Monday (and TVNewser doesn’t have numbers posted for Monday), I can understand the MSNBC ratings dig but the CNBC one is rather off base. Comparing CNBC prime to FNC prime is really apples and oranges. CNBC’s daytime ratings are what the network lives or dies by. Sure it would like to have a vibrant prime time but its brand identification is based on what happens in daytime. And a lot of the its viewers aren’t caught by Nielsen.

UPDATE: Revised entry once I found O’Reilly’s numbers were different.

Dan Abrams internal memo to staff on MSNBC’s SOTU coverage…

From: Abrams, Dan
Sent: Wednesday, January 24, 2007 4:46 PM
To: @MSNBC Everyone
Subject:

Wow. What a night for MSNBC! We already knew that our State of the Union coverage was by far the most interesting and comprehensive, but now we learn that we beat CNN handily in the key demographic for the night as well. In fact at 11 pm, we beat both Fox and CNN!

On an evening as important as this one, this victory represents a crucial turning point for this network. So many people deserve so much credit– from the dayside team that started us off with the “all politics” coverage led by Susan Sullivan and Meghan Schaefer, to the NBC and MSNBC anchors who hosted those hours throughout the day, to the prime time teams led by Bill Wolff, Izzy Povich and Chris Licht, and of course, to our all-star political team led by the tireless executive producer of the day and night, Tammy Haddad. Tammy and her team must be singled out for their leadership and hard work resulting in a day that should make us all proud.

A special thanks to Tim Russert, Brian Williams, Tom Brokaw, Andrea Mitchell, Ann Curry, David Gregory, Campbell Brown, Chip Reid, Tucker Carlson, Norah O’Donnell and Phil Alongi. Joe Scarborough’s coverage from the floor and late-night anchoring also helped distinguish us.
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No letup in the O’Reilly vs. NBCMSNBCBrokawEngelOlbermannMatthewsScarborough war. From Johnny Dollar…

Bill’s talking about NBC again this hour on radio. He apparently may do something tonight on it again as he said he has a clip for “ER” that he’s planning to showcase tonight. And the beat goes on…

Well we’re way past feud status this week. Round 3 (or 4 depending on what day you started counting) of the war between O’Reilly and NBCMSNBCBrokawEngelOlbermannScarboroughMatthews happened tonight starting with The Factor’s Talking Points Memo.

…again dissent about the war? Fine. Rooting for America to lose? Disloyal. And then there’s the press. Unfortunately many in the media now have a vested interest in seeing the U.S. fail in Iraq. No doubt about it. If Iraq were to turn and go America’s way, President Bush would rise in the polls and Republicans would have a better chance in 2008. The Left wing media does not want that to happen. NBC News is leading the way in that regard. Listen to this question by Chris Matthews…

What would justify sending 30,000..40,000 GIs into the streets of Baghdad to kick down doors and kill Sunnis? What would convince you that was the right policy?

Kick down doors and kill Sunnis….very nice. Listen to this comment by Tom Brokaw about Saddam’s execution…

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The AP’s David Bauder wraps up coverage for the service for President Gerald Ford…

Former NBC News anchorman Tom Brokaw, who also delivered a eulogy, noted that Ford realized, upon leaving office, that he wasn’t perfect.

“But what president ever was?” he said. The camera cut to a picture of President Bush.

Reality wasn’t far away. Fox News Channel noted that many politicians, as they exited the church, were checking their Blackberrys. CNN switched to other news more quickly than its cable news rivals; Fox trained a respectful camera on an unmoving plane with Ford’s body until it took off for Michigan.

Then Brit Hume uttered his version of the day’s most frequently repeated line, also used by Gibson and Couric.

As Couric said it, Ford “was about to leave the nation’s capital for the very last time.”

At 5pm ET all CNN, MSNBC, and FNC were all focused in on Washington D.C. for Aireforce 1 (the plane isn’t being called that since that’s only used when the President is on board…it’s official designation for this flight is Special Air Mission 29,000) to land carrying President Gerald Ford’s body. With the gravity of the situation, the networks are putting on their A-teams. CNN has Wolf Blitzer, FNC has Chris Wallace, and MSNBC has Chris Matthews.

UPDATE: Tom Brokaw joined Chris Matthews…

UPDATE 2: Screengrabs…

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MSNBC will be airing special programming at 10 and 11pm tonight. Hardball will be airing at 10pm and the Time & Again special on Ford will be re-airing at 11pm. This is in addition to the other Ford related programs scheduled for tonight…

TUCKER” (6:00 P.M.-7:00 P.M. ET)
Host: Guest Host - Pat Buchanan
Topic/Guests:

REMEMBERING GERALD R. FORD: James Cannon, assistant to President Ford
for Domestic Affairs from 1974-1977; David Hume Kennerly, President
Ford’s personal photographer; Congressman John D. Dingell (D-MI)

“HARDBALL WITH CHRIS MATTHEWS” (7:00-8:00 P.M. ET)
Host: Chris Matthews
Topics/Guests:
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Picking up the coverage via overnight emails…

FNC was the victim of some phone problems, though it’s not clear to me where the problem was. Alexander Haig had to be dropped at one point because the line noise was so bad. Maybe Haig was on a cell in a poor coverage area

At 1:53 am MSNBC got hit by another round of hard breaks according to email. You’d think after the first incident that there wouldn’t be a repeat. I guess not.

- Alex Witt was called in to handle early morning coverage on MSNBC. Chris Matthews took over around 8 am. At one point Matthews had Tom Brokaw on to talk about Ford.

- I haven’t heard who covered CNN overnight until American Morning started (I’ll lay odds AM kicked off early this morning).

UPDATE: Good thing I’m not a bookie. CNN did not start American Morning early apparently.

- Jamie Colby was called in to FNC to anchor late night coverage. MSNBC ran a Time & Again episode on Ford with a hastily added Keith Olbermann open. (Olbermann was on the phone last night…did he phone in the intro as well? Not sure). Apparently FNC was touting that it was the only network with live coverage at one point if this thread is to be believed…

- As of now Shepard Smith will be coming back in from vacation to cover the story. Neil Cavuto will also be back today for Your World.

Official break-in times:

FNC: 11:48:42pm
CNN: 11:50:14pm
MSNBC: NBC coverage broke in at 11:50:32

BTW, the story of Ford’s death leaked out long before this but apparently the nets were sitting on the story until it was official. That happened at around 11:48 when the AP ran the story. So at that point it was a pure horse race to see who would get to air first. FNC was more ready even though CNN was already live with Anderson Cooper 360 (CNN may have been in a commercial break at the time…I have no idea).

UPDATE: Eat The Press’ Sklar liked that Brian Williams canned package on Ford…better than FNC’s pundits apparently…

UPDATE 2: The TVSpyers are debating the coverage so far. Some are not fans of Anderson Cooper…

MSNBC announced this afternoon that Tom Brokaw and John Edwards will be joining Chris Matthews for two Hardball College Tour stops at Fordham University and the University of North Carolina…

MSNBC’s “Hardball with Chris Matthews” continues its hugely popular “Hardball College Tour” this December with two special guests, NBC News Special Correspondent and former “NBC Nightly News” Anchor and Managing Editor Tom Brokaw and former senator, former vice presidential nominee, and prospective 2008 presidential candidate John Edwards.

Brokaw will join Chris Matthews at Fordham University on Monday, Dec. 4 for a live show at 5:00 p.m. (ET), repeating at 7:00 p.m. (ET). Edwards will join Matthews at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on Monday, Dec. 11 for a live show at 5:00 p.m. (ET), repeating at 7:00 p.m. (ET). In keeping with the “Hardball College Tour” tradition, both shows will take place before a live audience where students will have the opportunity to ask questions.
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An emailer noted that MSNBC TV is advertising Tom Brokaw will be appearing on the Hardball College Tour on Monday December 4th…

UPDATE: This entry has been rewritten. The original entry was going on the information which suggested that this episode was on Monday, when it was actually the following Monday. ICN regrets the error.

Here’s a partial transcript of Don Imus’ comments on MSNBC’s coverage and other election related items from various times this morning…

Imus: Now there’s ugliness here at MSNBC I understand, because Chris Matthews accused Joe Scarborough, well I don’t know anything about it, I just know what I’ve been told of being biased in his coverage, having an agenda, but if anybody has an agenda it’s Chris Matthews. I mean it’s fine, but it’s clear. Clear. Scarborough - I mean neither one of them are must see television by the way. But Scarborough is far more down the middle than Matthews is.

Co-host: No doubt

Imus: So then they got in an on-air argument?

Co-host: There was an on-air incident after the allegations, I mean, again I can’t remember exactly how Matthews had couched it, but nevertheless, it drew a very strong, quiet, almost clenched teeth response from Mr. Scarborough defending how he treats his program, how he treats both parties and he said it’s all there for anybody to review, chapter and verse, you can just look at the transcripts.
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The Baltimore Sun’s David Zurawik writes about the 2006 midterm election coverage…

For all the interest in seeing the new network anchors on their first big story after the era of Jennings, Rather and Brokaw, cable channels CNN, Fox News and MSNBC, which have become much larger forces on election coverage, will offer continuous coverage throughout the night. Brit Hume will be at the anchor desk for Fox, while Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann will front the coverage at MSNBC.

The networks will try to counter instantaneous cable coverage tonight with Web sites that have grown tremendously in the past two years. They offer the latest vote counts, exit polling data and analysis. Much like newspapers, the networks see tonight as a potential landmark moment in their digital future, and they are promising a strong online effort - including with their TV anchors.
______________

“We’re ready for anything - we’re ready for a long night or a short night,” says Wolf Blitzer, who will be joined at the CNN anchor desk by Anderson Cooper, Lou Dobbs and Paula Zahn.
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Earlier today on CNN Newsroom, Kyra Phillips interviewed her mentor Art Buchwald. Partial transcript follows…

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Welcome back.

BUCHWALD: Thank you. Are there any messages?

PHILLIPS (voice-over): He’s being hailed as the celebrity of death.

(on camera) So, Art, I’ve known you for 20 years. Where do we start?

BUCHWALD: Where do we start? Well, we start at a heck of a place. It’s a hospice.

PHILLIPS (voice-over): Are you laughing too? Well, that’s exactly what Art Buchwald wants.

BUCHWALD: I remember the first month, all my buddies showed up, all of them. It was like Radio City Music Hall. They used to say at the beginning, “Have you seen the Lincoln Memorial and Art Buchwald?”
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The Hollywood Reporter’s Paul J. Gough spends most of his space writing about Tom Brokaw being part of NBC/MSNBC’s election coverage but he also notes that FNC’s Shepard Smith will be starting a road tour today in the run up to the 2006 midterm elections…

Meanwhile, Fox News Channel said it would send Shepard Smith on the road Tuesday for its “You Decide 2006″ tour. Smith, who was on the road several times this year with “Studio B” and “The Fox Report” for the channel’s 10th anniversary, will be in Escondido, Calif., Tuesday. The show is traveling to Overland Park, Kan., Chesterfield, Mo., Germantown, Tenn., and Patterson, N.J.

The channel said Smith will talk to candidates and voters at each of the stops.

NBC News put out a release on its Decision 2006 Midterm election night coverage…

NBC News will cover all angles of the mid term elections using the powerful resources of NBC News, MSNBC on cable, MSNBC.com, CNBC, Telemundo, NBC Mobile and NBC News Radio on Election Day, Tuesday, November 7, 2006. NBC News will offer the best and most experienced team in television, with Brian Williams anchoring NBC News’ live “Decision 2006″ coverage from the NBC News world headquarters at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York. Joining Williams will be “Meet the Press” moderator and senior political analyst Tim Russert, and NBC Special correspondent Tom Brokaw. “Weekend Today” co-anchors Campbell Brown will report on voter trends and Lester Holt will look ahead at the 2008 presidential race.

A veteran team of NBC News correspondents will fan out across the country and report on key Senate, House and gubernatorial races, and will include Ron Allen, Tom Costello, Lisa Daniels, Rehema Ellis, Chris Jansing, George Lewis, Ron Mott, Mark Potter, David Shuster, Don Teague, Kevin Tibbles, and Mike Viqueira. NBC News’ Chief White House correspondent David Gregory will report from the White House, and NBC’s Congressional correspondent Chip Reid will cover Capitol Hill.
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Tom Brokaw made an appearance on MSNBC just before the 1pm ET hour. Brokaw was interviewed by Chris Jansing regarding his interview with California Governer Arnold Schwarzenegger. Large portions of the interview were aired. Jansing and Brokaw also discussed the 2006 Congressional Midterms.

UPDATE: The Hardball Daily Briefing says Brokaw will be on Hardball tonight to discuss the interview…

The San Francisco Chronicle’s Tim Goodman takes a dim view of NBCU 2.0…

Having said many times that the TV industry is run on fear and cluelessness, it’s always nice to have NBC confirm this so frequently. Thursday was no exception. Never mind the 700 — or was it 7,000? — layoffs that are planned. That’s a business story. Never mind, even, the NBC News/MSNBC/CNBC mash-up that may soon take place, above and beyond office space consolidation.

You can take all your doomsday junkies who talk about the end of journalism and how bad that is for the world and put them in a sealed room. The point is not that NBC wants to kill the nightly news or even televised news as we know it. NBC, and parent company GE, want to make money, period. If they think they can make a dollar by having Keith Olbermann sit on Brian Williams’ shoulders and do a post-Brokaw, dog-and-pony deconstruction of the day’s news, they’ll do it.

And, by the way, NBC is not alone in wanting news to make more money. Every network does. NBC just wrapped it up in a bunch of Web 2.0 nonsense it knows nothing about. (Maybe it will start hyping Williams’ blog as a download on iTunes?)