Can you say "bitter"? That's the vibe Slate.com Editor-in-Chief Jacob Weisberg gave off in an Oct. 17 column, which will appear in the Oct. 26 issue of Newsweek, about Fox News headlined "The O'Garbage Factor."

Weisberg, who once diagnosed former President George W. Bush with a learning disability, contends the Fox News Channel goes beyond just making liberal media elitist like himself cringe - it's actually un-American. Weisberg alluded to the recent rift between the White House and the Fox News Channel.

He contended, with an almost-overdone effort to be self-righteous and snarky, that the analysis of the feud, done on a recent broadcast of "The O'Reilly Factor," was all just too slanted for his tastes. He went along with the left-wing noise machine's notion that Bill O'Reilly, who isn't exactly a Reagan Republican, is some sort of tool of the right-wing.

Rupert Murdoch has become the first media mogul to make bold changes to his company’s newspaper monetization strategy that may reshape the way people receive their news--by paying for it.

Up to this point, web publications have primarily relied on advertising alone for revenues but this has had problems because online advertising rates are so much lower than those in print. Murdoch and others in the traditional media are seeking to change that by creating a system where readers and viewers are required to pay a subscription fee as well.

There is certainly a motivation to try something different. Overall, News Corp.’s operating income dropped by over 30 percent in its latest earning report. Its cable networks are the only holdings to be driving growth this year, with Fox News’ operating income increasing by 50 percent.

Clearly, much of News Corp.’s struggles are due to the recession, but newspapers have been struggling long before the recession. With content available for free online, fewer people are paying to subscribe to newspapers and magazines.

Americans have been reluctant to pay for subscription fees for news content online, especially after having received it for free for fifteen years, so will News. Corp’s plan succeed? There are not many details as of yet on what kind of subscription plans Murdoch plans to establish, but there has been a lot of attention as of late on a plan put forth by newspaper editor-turned Silicon Valley CEO Alan Mutter. At a meeting of newspaper executives in May, Mutter talked about his new venture, ViewPass.

On Monday’s Countdown show, MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann disputed a claim by a New York Times article that there exists a truce between FNC and MSNBC as he accused the Times’s Brian Stelter of ignoring Olbermann’s denial that such a truce existed, and contended that the story was a "misinterpretation" of the Countdown host’s own pledge from June 1 to discontinue Bill O’Reilly’s inclusion in the show’s regular "Worst Person in the World" segment because Olbermann blamed O’Reilly for abortion Doctor George Tiller’s assassination.

During Monday’s "Worst Person" segment, Olbermann awarded the third place dishonor to Stelter: "Mr. Stelter asked me at least twice last week if there was such a deal, and I told him on and off the record there was not, and I told him I rather obviously would have to be a party to such a deal, and I told him that not only wasn't I, but I had not even been asked to be by my bosses. And he printed it anyway, and I had even written to him that this was merely a misinterpretation of an announcement I made here on June 1 that because Bill O'Reilly of Fox News had abetted the assassination of Dr. George Tiller, he'd become too serious to joke about..."

Although the ongoing feud between Fox News's Bill O'Reilly and MSNBC's Keith Olbermann was apparently good for ratings -- likely more for the latter than the former, of course -- the heads of the parent companies of both networks stepped in recently to end the on-air squabble.

Not only that, but News Corporation's Rupert Murdoch and General Electric's Jeffrey Immelt were apparently coaxed into doing so by PBS's Charlie Rose.

The inside scoop was reported Saturday by the New York Times's Brian Stelter (h/t Bruce Bartlett):

Ah, Twitter.

The fast-moving microblogging technology has become a household name.  It is the technology that aided the recent Iranian uprising, that gave the global supporters of freedom and justice a way to communicate with the people on the ground in Iran – those poor, huddled masses, yearning to breathe free.

Like much of the Internet, it is also sometimes a hive-mind of absurdity.

Case in point: MSNBC’s David Shuster.  At approximately 4 p.m., July 7, Shuster graced the Twitterverse with this nugget:

By the way, for all of you watching on DirectTV and wondering why MSNBC is not in HD, ask mr. Murdoch/newscorps, the owner of DirectTV.

Ah yes, the wonderful figurehead of evil corporate moneymongers – the poster-child for all that is wrong (right?) with capitalism, Rupert Murdoch.  Surely the mighty Murdoch has decreed that MSNBC be broadcast only in low-resolution on his company’s satellites.

The Weekly Standard, founded by editor William Kristol and owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, is now under new ownership.

The conservative magazine has been acquired by Clarity Media, parent company of the Washington Examiner.

The deal, first reported by the L.A. Times on June 10, was made official this afternoon.

Clarity Media Group is owned by conservative billionaire Philip Anschutz, who wants to boost his political influence.

No one can accuse News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch of being an economic cheerleader, despite his net worth of $4 billion according to Forbes magazine.

In an interview with Fox News Channel and Fox Business Network anchor Neil Cavuto on April 2, Murdoch was not hopeful the financial markets would recover their value within the next 12 months.

"Look, I'm not a market expert," Murdoch said. "I would say this is a bear market rally still. We're not going back to the old levels in any hurry at all. That's two or three years away."

"The View's" Joy Behar believes last week's controversial New York Post cartoon which mocked the recently enacted stimulus bill represented an assassination threat on President Barack Obama.

She even wonders if the author should be investigated by the FBI.

I kid you not.

As host Barbara Walters on Tuesday addressed Rupert Murdoch's apology for the cartoon published in his paper, Behar said the following (video embedded below courtesy Ms Underestimated):

CNBC's Joe Kernen had some fun at the New York Times' expense Monday morning, so much so that whether you love Rick Santelli's Rant Heard 'Round The World, or just can't stand the Grey Lady, you're guaranteed to bust a gut.

To set this up, the NY Times on Monday ran an article bashing media mogul Rupert Murdoch for actually liking -- wait for it!!! -- newspapers -- stop the presses!!! -- as well as a piece criticizing CNBC for having the nerve to publicize Santelli's rant last Thursday.

Oh the humanity!

This didn't sit well with Kernen who tore the Times to shreds both figuratively AND literally (video embedded below the fold, h/t TVNewser):

Rupert Murdoch has his critics - from those who think his papers are too tabloid-ish - The Sun, The New York Post - to those who find his cable television networks too right-leaning for their tastes. And back in 2007, there was a fear that his purchase of The Wall Street Journal would result in a hybrid of his newspapers and his cable news channels.

However, a year after Murdoch's acquisition, Newsweek senior editor and financial columnist Daniel Gross said he thought Murdoch has actually improved the Journal.

"I think it's worked out quite well for him," Gross said on CNBC's "Power Lunch" Dec. 16. "He owns one of the best newspapers around. They remade the Journal. The front section is a great kind of political, global coverage."

Gross also said it doesn't look like such a bad deal for the journalists employed at financial newspaper, especially in a time of print newspaper hardships - which have resulted in layoffs and cutbacks - like The New York Times and the Tribune newspapers owned by billionaire Sam Zell.

"I think the journalists - I never thought I would say this - the journalists are quite lucky to be working for Murdoch in this type of environment. You could be working for a company that was owned by Sam Zell or one of his publicly held newspapers."

Rupert Murdoch thinks the newspaper industry will survive its current downturn, but that many editors, reporters, and owners will not.

The reason for their likely demise is that many of them betrayed the trust of their readers: "It takes no special genius to point out that if you are contemptuous of your customers, you are going to have a hard time getting them to buy your product."

As reported by CNet Sunday, Murdoch gave some straight talk about his industry during a lecture sponsored by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation:

As Fox News prepares to interview Barack Obama tomorrow night, during prime time, TV journalist Michael Wolff details a meeting between Barack Obama, Fox News president Roger Ailes, and News Corporation president Rupert Murdoch in which the Fox execs promised to lay off the Democratic presidential candidate.

According to Wolff's telling, this was more than a mere tete-à-tete, this was a full-on diplomatic meeting (initiated at Murdoch's request), conducted only after preparation and with preconditions from the Obama campaign.

The apparent purpose? To smooth things over in the event that Obama defeats John McCain:

Now that former White House press secretary Scott McClellan has written a tell-all book about the Bush administration, he's being lauded with so much praise from the usual liberal media suspects that it must be making MSNBC's Keith Olbermann a tad jealous.

This makes Chris Wallace's interview Thursday with WOR radio's Steve Malzberg even more timely, for the "Fox News Sunday" host showed his colleagues what the term "journalism" really means by going after both of these press darlings.

First, Wallace discussed a key question he'd like to ask McClellan that's been completely absent as media applaud the former press secretary's claims (17 minute audio available here, relevant section at minute 6:00):

Aside from President Bush, one of the left's favorite boogeymen is Rupert Murdoch, CEO of News Corporation, owner of the Fox television networks and myriad newspapers around the globe. Murdoch, as the story goes, is deliberately foisting a far-right ideology upon the world, intent upon making it to support his personal political agenda.

In order for that to be true, however, paranoid lefties have to ignore a lot of evidence that Murdoch's words and deeds are hardly those of a consistently conservative person. The media exec demonstrated that once again today by heaping praise upon "rock star" Barack Obama while heavily criticizing his Republican rival John McCain as ignorant about economics, "unpredicable," and having "a lot of problems."

"I want to meet Obama. I want to know is he going to walk the walk. Have you read his education policy, what it is? It's just great. [...] I just hope that he's as good as he promises."

Washington Post media writer Howard Kurtz reported on Monday’s front page that the on-screen feud between FNC’s Bill O’Reilly and MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann has spurred high-level calls between the top executives at Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation and NBC: "What began four years ago as a colorful feud between rival commentators, instigated by Olbermann as a way of drawing attention, has become a tale of bruised egos and secret maneuvering at the highest levels of two multinational giants."

Murdoch, FNC boss Roger Ailes, NBC boss Jeffrey Zucker, and General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt have all been involved:

Ailes called Zucker on his cellphone last summer, clearly agitated over a slam against him by MSNBC host Keith Olbermann. According to sources familiar with the conversation, Ailes warned that if Olbermann didn't stop such attacks against Fox, he would unleash O'Reilly against NBC and would use the New York Post as well.

Both Fox and the Post are owned by Murdoch, who complained about Olbermann's conduct in separate calls to Zucker and Immelt.

The conspiracy theory that Rupert Murdoch would ruin The Wall Street Journal with his tabloid conservatism is even struggling on the Journal's traditionally conservative editorial pages. The Journal's newly redesigned pages will now feature a weekly column from leftist cultural analyst Thomas Frank to underline "what's on the mind of the American left." Frank is by no means the first leftist on those pages, for anyone who can recall Michael Gartner (who also became president of NBC News), but it does frustrate the Rupert's Right-Wing Ruination spin.

Frank's inaugural column took some credit for Obama's San Francisco declaration that the voters have bitterness and cling to their guns and religion and xenophobia instead of noticing their class interests. Frank dutifully unloaded on conservatives:

Interesting media news this Monday as Newsweek takes a look at the coming war between the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. The mag's piece in turn sparked a newspaper industry news boomlet as other publications rushed to find out whether Newsweek's claim that liberal Democrat Republican New York mayor Michael Bloomberg might give the New York Times Company a cash infusion to "protect the brand."

Not so, says Bloomberg, who denied the claim that he was trying to get into the newspaper biz or purchase a share in Times Co.

An excerpt from the excellent Newsweek piece that started it all is below the fold...

Over at Media Bistro's fishbowlDC blog Patrick W. Gavin was on hand to live-blog an appearance by News Corp's Rupert Murdoch who visited Georgetown University's Gaston Hall to talk about the shape of today's media landscape. As reported by Gavin, Murdoch had some interesting things to say. Among his comments was that we shouldn't have any fear that the media is becoming less free and.... oh, yeah... he claimed that CNN has "always been extremely liberal." (Gosh, who knew?)

Murdoch also commented on the state of TV and how it can no longer assume it can reach such a "mass audience."

To riff off the Alice Roosevelt Longworth line: if you don't have anything nice to say about Rupert Murdoch, go sit next to David Shuster. The MSNBCer and former Fox Newser has no love lost for his old employer.

Shuster's latest is that Hillary, she of long memory, will be holding a grudge against Murdoch, whose NewsCorp owns the New York Post and Fox News, for the unflattering coverage the Post gave Clinton in the closing days of the New Hampshire primary campaign.

View video here.

So, did you hear about that chemical explosion at Fox News Channel's headquarters in Manhattan yesterday?

Fortunately, there were no fatalities.

However, judging by some of the comments at USA Today's On Deadline blog, not everyone was pleased by the lack of injuries.

In fact, some were wishing ill for Fox employees and management (reader is advised to proceed with caution, as the following is a tad offensive):