Alison Stewart

On Friday’s Need to Know program on PBS, humorist Andy Borowitz devoted his regular "Next Week’s News" fake news segment to the story that he is supposedly leaving the show after this week. After showing clips of himself from previous episodes, he ended the segment by taking a shot at Fox News Channel as he joked that he will be moving to FNC next week because he so enjoys making up "fake news." Borowitz: "Now, what's next for Andy Borowitz? Well, I love doing two minutes of fake news each week, but it's whetted my appetite to do fake news on a full-time basis. And so, starting next week, I'm moving to my new home: The Fox News Channel." Video of the segment can been here.

Below is a complete transcript of the Friday, September 17, "Next Week’s News" segment from PBS’s Need to Know program:

On Friday’s Need to Know program on PBS, during the show’s semi-regular allegedly humor-based "Next Week’s News" portion of the show, Andrew Borowitz devoted the entire segment to mocking Sarah Palin’s intelligence as he faux-predicted that, after winning the 2012 presidential election, "Her first official act will be to cancel the agreement between nouns and verbs," and that she will then "replace the English language with ‘Palinese,’ a language known only to her." He added: "He also asserted: "I figure if we learn three words a day, in two years we might have a shot at understanding her State of the Union Address."

Using Palin’s recent "refudiate" Twitter misspelling as a premise, Borowitz made up other words to jab the former Alaska governor’s intelligence, as he alluded to her history of writing notes on her hands, and used the made-up word "rignorant" to portray her as stupid for wanting to continue oil drilling in the ocean after the BP oil spill disaster.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer are "moderate" liberals.  And GOP opposition to Obama Supreme Court nominees would constitute a "fake fight" demonstrating that Republicans remain mired in the culture wars.  Such was the collective wisdom of two of the roundtable members on ABC's "This Week" today.

Before moving to the substance, a word about the roundtable's lopsided composition, which resembled nothing more than Homecoming for public radio types.  To "balance" David Brody of CBN, ABC chose Kurt Andersen of Public Radio International, Alison Stewart of NPR, and John Dickerson of Slate and . . . NPR.  Andersen kicked off the Supreme Court segment with his "moderate" liberal comment.  Dickerson followed with his pre-emptive warning about that potential Republican "fake fight."

On Tuesday’s Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC, Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter couldn’t imagine why anyone would see conflict-of-interest troubles if Hillary Clinton becomes Secretary of State while her husband the ex-president has a sprawling international foundation with its mitts in a long list of countries. Alter insisted all of Clinton’s work is "very, very positive. It’s been for great causes around the world." Alison Stewart guest-hosted for Maddow, and pushed the button that started Alter’s Bill-burnishing remarks:

STEWART: Is Bill Clinton a stumbling block for Hillary Clinton getting the Secretary of State gig?

ALTER: You know, I don’t think he really is, unless, for some reason, they just refuse to disclose as much as the Obama people want them to. There’s nothing that's all that terrible here. Most of the money that Clinton has raised, in fact, it's very, very positive. It's been for great causes around the world. Fighting poverty. Fighting AIDS.

Given his show's modest ratings, it's unlikely that Keith Olbermann would be in a position to make a multi-million dollar donation to charity anytime soon. But let's imagine he did. Do you think that, in a segment on a related subject, NBC might find a moment to mention Olbermann's generosity?

So do I.

But "Today" managed to get through its report this morning about Rush Limbaugh's auctioning off of the Harry Reid letter . . . without mentioning that Rush has publicly pledged to match the $2.1 million winning bid.

View video here.

Filling in on July 17 for Keith Olbermann, MSNBC's Alison Stewart devoted a "Countdown" segment to criticizing the dress Wendy Vitter wore during a July 16 news conference in which her husband, Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), admitted to an affair with a prostitute.

With "Fashion Ho-Pas?" emblazoned on-screen (pictured at right), Stewart interviewed Radar Online's Jeff Bercovici, who snarked that Vitter's sartorial choice could mark "a complete reversal of the laws of skankery." [Video (1:37): Real (2.54 MB) and Windows (2.90MB), plus MP3 audio (753 kB)]

Olbermann returned to his program's hosting duties the next day and also hosted the July 19 program before turning over the helm yet again to Stewart for his July 20 show*, despite having had three days to become aware of the "ho-pas" segment, take disciplinary action against Stewart, and make her issue an apology. Olbermann either saw the light or felt the heat over the weekend, apparently, as he issued an apology about one-third of the way through his July 23 program (h/t Ian Schwartz):