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The New York Times features an exhaustive report today on the feuding between the McCain and Palin camps, but it is best savored while listening to Carl Cameron of Fox News Channel, who finally spills what he has been hearing for months from McCain insiders or "folks" as he calls them. This quote proves that Cameron has an unappreciated talent for understatement:

We are told by folks that she didn’t know what countries were in NAFTA – the North American Free Trade Agreement – that being Canada, the US and Mexico. And we’re told she didn’t understand that Africa is a continent rather than just a country just in itself – a whole host of questions that caused serious problems about her knowledgeability.  read more »

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Assemblyman Michael Benjamin, an early Obama supporter from the Bronx, thinks the media is perpetuating a storyline about conflict between the Obama camp and the Clintons. It doesn't really exist, he told me earlier today in the Pepsi Center.

Later, I got an email from Benjamin about Hillary Clinton's speech, which he thinks should put to rest any question about a divided party.

Sen. Clinton delivered a knockout blow to those sought to foment dissension and disunity. She outdid Sen. Kennedy and she showed greater statesmanship and party loyalty than he did in 1980. Her speech will go down as the greatest seconding speech in American political history. Hillary, you go girl!

DENVER—Brit Hume, Bill Kristol, Mort Kondracke and Fred Barnes were kicking around some ideas to discuss on the air as they climbed the stairs to Fox’s Election HQ newsroom, when they bumped into Howard Wolfson.

“You caused a huge uproar today,” Kondracke said approvingly, referring to a piece Wolfson had written urging Obama to reach out to Bill Clinton. “You were on the top of all the blogs.”

Wolfson, the longtime Democratic strategist and former communications director for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, smiled at their good-natured ribbing. They laughed when he laughed. Noisy, full of camaraderie and good cheer, the five of them almost looked like a team.  read more »

Rapper Nas joined members of MoveOn.org and Color of Change today outside FOX News headquarters to protest what they say is the network’s racist coverage of Barack Obama, black institutions and black people. Color of Change claims about 620,000 people signed petitions against FOX News.

An hour after he was scheduled to appear, the self-labeled Black Republican finally emerged from an SUV in a white t-shirt and jeans. He gave a short speech berating FOX for its “racist smears on Obama and all black Americans.”

“We already knew that FOX is not a news network, they are propaganda machine,” Nas said.  read more »

Michael Falcone of The New York Times' The Caucus blog is reporting that organizers of the liberal blogger conference Netroots Nation are insisting that if Fox News wants credentials to the event, currently being held in Austin, Texas, they need special tags designating them "opinion media."

"Fox News calls itself fair and balanced, but it’s not," Mr. Falcone quotes Josh Orton, the political director for Netroots.

Fox News' response? According to The Times, the network isn't sending anyone to the event. Take that!

Salon's Vincent Rossmeier has an interview with Kerwin Swint, biographer of Fox news Godfather Roger Ailes. Mr. Swint, a Professor of Political Science Kennesaw State University, says he "couldn't believe that no one had written a book on him yet. He's been such a central figure for so long."

In 2003, The New Yorker's Ken Auletta described Mr. Ailes as "a man of Falstaffian girth... Ailes is sixty-three and does not look immediately fearsome. He says he is five feet nine inches tall and weighs two hundred and twenty-five pounds; his jowls droop over his collar. With his pallor and barely perceptible eyebrows, Ailes looks like someone who has spent a lifetime under fluorescent lights.  read more »

MANCHESTER, N.H.—Twelve-story buildings qualify as skyscrapers here, so when you come into town, the Radisson on Elm Street is one of the first things you see.

It’s the hotel where NBC, ABC and C-SPAN are all kipping, and it’s also where Hillary Clinton’s campaign bus drops and picks up reporters every day, and where New Yorker political reporter Ryan Lizza said he comes to have a drink at night.  read more »

Having just completed its purchase of Dow Jones, News Corp. has announced that it will be selling eight of its Fox-affiliated TV stations to Oak Hill Capital Partners for approximately $1.1 billion in cash.

The sale--which includes stations in Cleveland, Birmingham, and Kansas City--will leave News Corp. with 27 owned-and-operated stations.  read more »

Much has been said of Rupert Murdoch's planned Fox Business Channel, and how it makes his bid to buy Dow Jones, Inc. necessary.

But even as Mr. Murdoch appears to grow "frustrated" with talks to purchase Dow Jones, the launch of News Corp's Fox Business channel is going ahead as planned, according to a statement released yesterday afternoon and posted on mediabistro.com:  read more »

You know those people who think they know everything because they watch The Daily Show with Jon Stewart?

Maybe they do!

The Pew Research Center recently surveyed viewers of The Daily Show, among some 1,500 subjects, and concluded they were the most knowledgeable audience when it comes to the things the makers of the survey find out about by reading the news the same time Mr. Stewart’s writers do.  read more »

Milton Glaser, the grandfather of New York graphic design, has sold his grandfatherly third-floor du  read more »

The 10 Most Expensive Buildings in New York City If every New York City office building went up for sale, which ones would sell for the highest price? The Observer asked the denizens of the real estate world--the people who buy the buildings and the ones who trade them--which towers they thought would close with the biggest price tags. Go to story by John Koblin. The Crisis of the Upper-Middle Class: Big Pay Is Piddling in New York Pity upper-middle class Manhattanites. The average sales price of apartments here has spiked so extremely--tripling in the last decade to a record $1,295,445, according to a recent Prudential Douglas Elliman report--that only the most excessively well-heeled can become local owners. Go to story by Max Abelson. City Mean to Developers Being Green? Despite the hype about green roofs; despite the rampant branding of luxury residences with names like The Solaire and Tribeca Green; despite the cachet that once-repulsive ideas have now garnered (waterless urinals! recycled rainwater!); technologies that allow buildings to generate at least a portion of their own power in a clean, efficient way are having trouble catching on in Manhttan. Go to story by Matthew Schuerman. Another for Broadway Partners! Busy Firm Buys 280 Park for $1.2 B. The most ferocious investment firm of the last six months, Broadway Partners, is in contract to purchase 280 Park Avenue from Istithmar for a little more than $1.2 billion, a source said. Murray Hill Properties Nabs 1180 Avenue of the Americas for $300 M. One of the city's most active landlords, Murray Hill Properties, is in contract to purchase 1180 Avenue of the Americas for at least $300 million, a source said. Go to Commercial Breaks by John Koblin. New Whole Foods Seeks 21st Amendment Whole Foods' whopping 71,000-square-foot new supermarket opened last week on the Bowery at Houston Street, boasting perhaps the most extensive selection of groceries in Manhattan--though not a drop of alcohol. No organic Oregonian red wines. No earthy Vermont microbrews. Not even any gluten-free sorghum beers. Humble Ping-Pong Racket Merely a (Store)front for Entreprenuerial Brothers Barely one and a half weeks into existence, the tiny table-tennis club on Norfolk Street, which features only one ping-pong table, was already experiencing supply problems. Not that the owners' livelihood depends on it. Go to Counter Espionage by Chris Shott. No Contract for $59 M. Guccione Mansion, But 'The Conservative American Loves It' The brashest mansion in Manhattan, a nearly 20,000-square-foot Beaux-Arts townhouse that belonged to porn magnate Bob Guccione before his money woes, has entered its 13th month on the market. N.F.L. Commish, FOX News Anchor Hike 7-Room Co-Op for $2.72 M. Heartbreakingly, the Upper East Side has lost one of its all-American families: Roger Goodell, the new commissioner of the National Football League, and wife Jane Skinner, a brunette Fox News daytime anchoress (plus their twin daughters). The pedigree family sold its seven-room co-op at 180 East End Avenue late last month for $2.725 million. Go to Manhattan Transfers by Max Abelson. Mixing Legal and Liquor Join Noreen Healy, the only commissioner from the city on the State Liquor Authority, for a crawl through Manhattan's nightlife scene. She'll have an Amstel Light. Go to The Sit-Down by Chris Shott. Quarterly Figures Defy Dour Predictions "Dropped" remains a relative term in a Manhattan housing market that has apparently started 2007 with a bang, with just about every other sales-market barometer even more favorable to apartment sellers (and their brokers). Go to The Lab by Tom Acitelli. Buh-bye, Beige! Spring is here, sigh, a leaf trembles. If you're going to throw everything out the window and repaint top to bottom--which New Yorkers often do because they have so much time on their hands--what color is the color of the moment? Go to Interiors by Toni Schlesinger. The Times Machine Nobody at The New York Times seems to be able to talk about the paper's new building without talking about the future of the newspaper--or rather, the future of the news organization. Go to Off The Record by Michael Calderone. A Week in New York Real Estate Madonna's coming back! The Queen of Pop will be touring 179 Ludlow Street on the Lower East Side next week where she hopes to develop a three-floor kabbalah center. Go to Deeds and Deals.

Mike Bloomberg discussed one of the worst fires in recent history.

The list of committee chairmanships for the Assembly is here.

Ed Koch, Tom Suozzi and others will help review the state comptroller's office.

Newsday's Errol Cockfield has become the second Newsday staffer to defect to the ESDC.

John Edwards won't participate in the Fox News-sponsored debate for Democratic presidential candidates.

Ben has some vintage Rudy material.

And above is a Mathieu Eugene supporter explaining what all the fuss is about.

-- Azi Paybarah

Back in the warm confines of City Hall, I caught this moment on Fox News.

It's former Senate candidate KT McFarland talking about national security issues on, arguably, the channel most Republican primary voters choose to watch.

It's especially interesting to see McFarland playing ball with Fox, whose owner was condemned by her supporters for the way his media outlets covered her during the Senate race.

I guess she's over it.

-- Azi Paybarah

Anyone want the Bloomberg 2008 account?

The pollster who worked for Mike Bloomberg during his 2001 and 2005 campaigns would, presumably, have been the logical candidate to play the same roll on the mayor's oft-imagined presidential campaign.

But as Ben reported earlier, the pollster, Doug Schoen, is leaving the power-firm of Penn, Schoen and Berland to go work for Fox News.

Schoen has a "no compete" clause with the firm, meaning he won't be available to crunch numbers for Bloomberg (or any other candidate) if the mayor's presidential fancy ever becomes reality.

UPDATE: It's worth pointing out that Michael Berland, the third major figure at Schoen's old company, played a pivotal role in Bloomberg's elections and is, hypothetically, available if Bloomberg 2008 ever materializes.

FURTHER UPDATE: An informed source notes that Berland may have a similar no-compete clause, taking him out of consideration. (Penn is a pollster for Hillary.)

-- Azi Paybarah

Senator John Bonacic, who publicly called for Joe Bruno to step down from his leadership position in the face of an FBI probe, wasn't in the Senate chamber when the conference re-elected Bruno to another 2-year term.

Bonacic then avoided reporters waiting for him at one of the Senate chambers by taking the long route from the Senate to the Assembly, where I heard a reporter for Fox News caught him. Later, after Spitzer's state of the state, Bonacic tried slipping by the throng of reporters in the Assembly chamber's foyer who were waiting to chat with Mayor Bloomberg.

As he walked by, the tireless Michael Scotto of New York 1 News got Bonacic to talk, reluctantly.

"I don't think its appropriate today. The conference supported Joe Bruno, and this is not a day uh, to be belittling the leaders that the conference had picked. That's for another day."

That day should be fun. -- Azi Paybarah

At 10 a.m. Mayor Bloomberg is interviewed by Fox News Live

At 10:30 a.m. the Thanksgiving Invitational Turkey Eating Championship is held at Artie's Delicatessen (83rd Street and Broadway).

At noon, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, state Senator Jose Serrano and others rally in support of East Harlem's only public hospital (at 2nd Avenue and 98th Street).

At 5 p.m., Mayor Bloomberg attends the Macy's Thanksgiving Day balloon inflation.

The executive committee of the Central Brooklyn Independent Democrats meets at 7 p.m.

-- Azi Paybarah

When soon-to-be House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced her support for John Murtha’s bid for Hou  read more »

At 6:45:25 p.m. on Nov.  read more »

Fox News has declared Mike Arcuri the winner in New York's 24th Congressional District, defeating Republican Ray Meier in the race to succeed the retiring Sherwood Boehlert. CNN has not yet called the race, which Arcuri leads by about 10 points with two-thirds of the votes counted. -- Steve Kornacki

"I'm a big deal!" shouted Anthony Weiner as he walked down the steps of the Sheraton towards an interview with Fox News.

Weiner was joking about his new status in a Democratic majority. But he conceeded that the success will create some tensions between ambitious representatives.

"There is going to be a tussle within the Democratic Party," he said, and not only between politicians competing for plum jobs. "There are some forces in the Party that think we should be evening scores."

--Jason Horowitz

When even Fox News declares a Republican dead, you can take it to the bank the race is over. And so: R.I.P. John Hostettler. The Indiana Republican is now officially the first Republican Congressional incumbent to lose. His was a a top-target seat for the Democrats, but the apparent size of Democrat Brad Ellsworth's win is eye-opening.

The Washington Times, which mounts even less of an effort to mask its partisan leanings than the Fox News Channel, is an occasional source of amusement with its breathless adherence to the GOP message machine. Like this morning's if-we-keep-repeating-it-maybe-we-can-make-it-so headline and story: Kerry gaffe loses independents for his party

Here's the problem with this story, a one-note GOP talking point turgidly dressed up as a formal unveiling of news:

First, it is written off of a Pew survey that has the distinct look of an outlier - easily the closest (i.e. most GOP-friendly) generic ballot poll available on the market. To mention, for instance, that a Gallup poll (also conducted post-Kerry) actually has the Democrats ahead by 20 points would undercut the already flimsy legs of this story.

But that's not all.

From the Pew poll, one statistic of nebulous value is then- that 18 percent of independent voters had "serious doubts" about voting Democratic because of Kerry - and the story then proceeds to beat us over the head with its earth-shattering relevance, cluing in the brain dead among us that independents "are considered pivotal in today's congressional elections."

In a related development, it is considered likely that the sun will rise in the east tomorrow morning before setting, sometime later in the day, in the west.

The statistic about independents tells us little because - much in the way prosecutors are supposedly able to get juries to indict ham sandwiches - pollsters can always find 18 percent of independents troubled by just about any development in any campaign. And, if you read the fine print in the Pew poll itself (which the Times, of course, ignores) you will see that the 18 percent figure includes anyone who said the Kerry comment raised only "a little" doubt about his or her willingness to vote for the Democrats.

But a good Washington Times political story is never about facts or details. It's about a headline that hews to the GOP's message of the day, which in the run-up to the Election has been that Republicans are surging thanks to last-minute doubts about the Democrats. Hence the Times' assertion that this data - one broadly-worded question from one of the 62,000 or so polls now in circulation" - represents "a potentially significant shift of 'voting intentions' and raising speculation of further erosion among independents for the Democrats." Oh, and bonus points for tying it all to Kerry, a top-5 GOP bogeyman.

Also,

Hey, if it's in the paper, it must be true.

All of this makes us wonder how the paper will handle what will probably be very bad news for the GOP today. Suppose the Democrats win, say, 35 seats in the House and take back the Senate - essentially the doomsday scenario for the GOP. What will the headline read on tomorrow's Washington Times front page? Some suggestions:

Lugar, Hatch cruise in Indiana and Utah; Hastert easily re-elected to Illinois seat

or maybe:

Democrats take control of Congress - Pelosi yet to rule changing flag design to hammer and sickle.

The Washington Times, which mounts even less of an effort to mask its partisan leanings than the Fox News Channel, is an occasional source of amusement with its breathless adherence to the GOP message machine. Like this morning's if-we-keep-repeating-it-maybe-we-can-make-it-so headline: Kerry gaffe loses independents for his party

It makes us wonder how the paper will handle what will probably be very bad news for the GOP today. Suppose the Democrats win, say, 35 seats in the House and take back the Senate - essentially the doomsday scenario for the GOP. What will the headline read on tomorrow's Washington Times front page? Some suggestions:

Lugar, Hatch cruise in Indiana and Utah; Hastert easily re-elected to Illinois seat

or maybe:

Democrats take control of Congress - Pelosi yet to rule changing flag design to hammer and sickle.

While things may look grim for John Spencer, who is once again in the position of having to deny his own quotes, he's certainly getting more attention now.

He'll be on NY1 tonight, Fox News this afternoon and he'll appear tonight on Inside Edition. (Seriously.)

As for apologizing to Hillary for the comments, don't bet on it.

Spencer's spokesman Rob Ryan called to say, "There's nothing to apologize for. John Spencer never said she was ugly. Never said she had plastic surgery. And that's a fact."

-- Azi Paybarah

As anyone under the age of 52 can attest, the era of e-mail is over.  read more »

New York GOP fund-raiser extraordinaire Jason Weingartner appeared on FoxNews recently, only to have his friends comment on the size of his monstrous sideburns. Pictured above is a trimmed-down version of Weingartner's trademark burns, which were on display at a John Faso fund-raiser recently.  read more »

-- Azi Paybarah

“‘I’ll hug you,” said Roger Ailes. “I’ll hug you even though you’re a journalist.”  read more »

“‘I’ll hug you,” said Roger Ailes.  read more »

Here's the "food police" ad that the Daily News wrote about today. Although it's a direct response to the city's efforts to ban unhealthy fats from restaurants, the piece doesn't actually mention the offending "trans-fat" term.

It's from the Consumer Freedom Group, which is funded by a select portion of the food industry.

"Many of the companies and individuals who support the Center financially have indicated that they want anonymity as contributors. They are reasonably apprehensive about privacy and safety in light of the violence some activist groups have adopted as a "game plan" to impose their views."

The ad above is going to air on CNN and Fox News this week. Notice the guy who gets the beer knocked out of his hand. Exaggeration?

-- Azi Paybarah

The most amusing part of the confrontation between former President Bill Clinton and Fox News Sunday  read more »

So here's an invitiation for a fund-raiser to be headlined this Friday by Fox News personality Sean Hannity on behalf of embattled Republican Sen. George Allen of Virginia. (The "macaca" guy.)

It isn't exactly a shocker. But I wonder if stuff like this doesn't make it just a teensy bit more difficult for Fox to demand retractions when anyone refers to them as a conservative news organization.

-- Azi Paybarah

The Times Union reports that "the line between guarding Carol Hevesi during a time of threat and just driving her around appeared to be blurred. For one thing, Neustadt said, Acquafredda was not armed, nor was the comptroller in the habit of documenting threats to police agencies as they came in."

The Cornell Daily Sun says there will be protesters outside tonight's gubernatorial debate to demand universal health care.

The Conservative Party candidate for state senate is out of the race in Staten Island.

The City Planning Commission wants 600 fewer apartments in the Atlantic Yards Project.

There is a dispute over the chairmanship of the Independence Party on Staten Island.

Hillary Clinton liked Bill's performance on FoxNews Sunday.

Joe Lieberman calls Ned Lamont's Iraq policy a "slippery, deadly slope."

The American Spectator interviews a passenger who was on a plane with Rudy Giuliani when they suddenly hit turbulence.

Miles above Pennsylvania, an aircraft door-seal suddenly cracked. The cabin started to depressurize The pilot nose-dived the plane from 38,000 feet to a safer 9,000 feet. Oxygen masks popped out and dangled from the ceiling above the heads of horrified travelers...What did Giuliani do? "He put his mask over his face, picked the book back up, and kept reading Shakespeare."

And Pat Healy quotes an Iowa State professor praising George Pataki for trying to "raise his visibility and create some buzz."

-- Azi Paybarah

You'd think the day after Bill Clinton goes on Fox News and tells his interviewer, "You did Fox's bidding -- you did your nice little conservative hit job on me," the liberal netroots would be ecstatic. But some of them are considerably less impressed with the way Clinton's performance looks the morning after.

Ariana Huffington said that instead "of popping champagne corks, let's make use of this moment by stepping back and giving it some context. What can we learn from what happened? More specifically, what can Bill Clinton learn? That the bipartisan love-in he's been engaged in over the last several years has resulted in jack-squat."

Matt Stoller of MyDD said it's worse than jack-squat -- and is not going to help his wife either.

Bill Clinton's "bipartisan above-the-fray attitude which excuses his wife's fundraising events with the likes of Rupert Murdoch is going to slam head-on into the reality of the right-wing extremism that people like Murdoch put forward. Clinton stopped fighting the right when he left office, but they didn't stop fighting him."

-- Azi Paybarah

The Observer has learned that former Vice President Al Gore and business partner Joel Hyatt, an entr  read more »

John Spencer is going statewide with the 30-second biographical ad he released right before his debate with KT McFarland last month. A Spencer spokesman said they'll be running the ad on cable, since, according to their research, Republican primary votes watch plenty of cable news (read: Fox News).

Spencer's other ads, with images of Hillary Clinton and the president of Iran, are not scheduled to run for the rest of the primary, according to spokesman Rob Ryan. Either Spencer is taking the high road, or his campaign is pretty confident KT McFarland won't be on air any time soon.

-- Azi Paybarah

Shortly before 9:00 a.m. this morning, the Pentagon announced that the number of U.S. troops who have died in Iraq has reached 2,500.

In the wake of the announcement, the following happened:

Fox News released the results of a Fox News poll touting a five point rise in Bush's approval ratings.

White House spokesperson Tony Snow responded to reporters' questions about the death toll with the opening line, "It's a number. And every time there's one of these 500 benchmarks, people want something."

House Republicans and Democrats went head to head over a Republican-proposed resolution that says, among other things, that an "arbitrary date for the withdrawal or redeployment" of troops is not in the national interest.

And People magazine reported that Jessica Simpson likes to kiss with her eyes open.

-- Lizzy Ratner

What is New York’s Mayor up to?  read more »

What is New York’s Mayor up to?    read more »

F rom the A.P., May 8, 2006: “Iran’s leader has written to President Bush, in the first letter  read more »

There’s a growing genre of nonfiction that could be called “lefty paranoia about the evi  read more »

You’ve probably seen this guy, Bill O’Reilly.  read more »

You’ve probably seen this guy, Bill O’Reilly.  read more »

The Transom is surprised! Our progressive policies on child-rape are quite well known. So to have the Dayton Daily News lauded by retard-turned-pundit Bill O'Reilly for their sympathy to child-rapists is unhappymaking at best. What about our love of child-rape?

Mr. O'Reilly's complaint was that the News

"We never defended Judge Connor's decision to sentence a child molester to a year of house arrest and five years' probation," [Dayton Daily News editor Jeff] Bruce said Tuesday in a prepared statement. "What we said is that if the judge deserves to be removed from office, then due process should be followed—the same sort of due process that Bill O'Reilly relied upon when he was sued (for sexual harassment) and, ultimately, settled out of court."

O'Reilly was sued in 2004 by his former producer.

Fox News and Mr. O'Reilly, in their response, artfully set up Mr. Bruce with a fantastic defamation lawsuit when they called him "not an honest individual."

In the United States, the 1960’s lasted until about 1975, when substantial numbers of American  read more »

Quietly, on the Internet, the terms of the cable-news ratings battle have been reversed: Web audienc  read more »

This week, as NBC hammers out details on its proposed merger with Vivendi Universal Entertainment, f  read more »

From: Harriet E. Miers and Andrew H. Card Jr.  read more »

From: Harriet E. Miers and Andrew H.  read more »

From: Harriet E. Miers and Andrew H.  read more »