Outside Cable News

Via InTheBend
Tim Russert to speak Monday at Notre Dame
SOUTH BEND — Tim Russert, Washington bureau chief of NBC News, will deliver the 25th anniversary Red Smith Lecture in Journalism at the University of Notre Dame on Monday.

Russert’s lecture, “When Politicians Meet the Press,” will begin at 8 p.m. in Washington Hall.

The event is free and open to the public, but tickets are required. Tickets are available without charge at LaFortune Student Center ticket office. The student center is near the center of campus, just south of Washington Hall.

The ticket office opens daily at 9 a.m. and closes at 1 a.m. For more information, call the ticket office at (574) 631-8128.
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Via WSJ
CBS News, Katie Couric Are Likely to Part Ways
>EXCERPT

One possible new job for the Ms. Couric: succeeding Larry King at CNN. Mr. King, who is 74 years old, has a contract with the network into 2009. CNN President Jon Klein, a CBS veteran with close ties to some at the network, has expressed admiration for Ms. Couric’s work, and the two are friends. They had lunch in late January, and the anchor attended Mr. Klein’s birthday party in March. Time Warner Inc.’s CNN said, “Larry King is a great talent who consistently delivers the highest profile guests, and we have no plans to make a change.” Through a publicist, Mr. King declined to comment.

Mr. King’s talk-show slot at CNN might be a better fit than evening-newscast anchor for Ms. Couric, who is 51. She made her reputation as a skilled interviewer when she was an anchor at the “Today” show on General Electric Co.’s NBC network.

Via Radio Online
Talk Radio Network Syndicates The Monica Crowley Show

Monica Crowley signs with Talk Radio Network to syndicate “The Monica Crowley Show” under a special one-time arrangement and joint venture between TRN Entertainment and Dial-Global. Crowley made the transition to TRN from Westwood One last week and has added over 75 new affiliates, including WABC/New York, WTKK-FM/Boston, KFTK/St. Louis and WVIE/Baltimore.

“There is nobody on the radio today more on top of the days breaking issues than Monica Crowley. She is smart, knowledgeable and witty. Her fire and passion for the issues makes her a true standout in the field of syndicated talk,” commented VP of News/Talk Programming for WABC/New York Phil Boyce.
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Via Student Life
Political analyst Paul Begala to speak on campus
By Perry Stein

Politicos Lynn Cutler, Bruce Reed, Linda Moore and Paul Begala stand outside the West Wing of the White House, in Washington, D.C. Begala will speak on campus at 6 p.m. tonight.

Building off an election season with the highest youth participation rate in recent history, the College Democrats hope to further political discussion among students by bringing political analyst and CNN commentator Paul Begala to campus tonight at 6 p.m. in Louderman 458.

“For students who are interested in how the election works, he is the perfect speaker because he has both the insider and outsider perspective,” College Democrats Treasurer Eric Reif, a sophomore, said. “We thought it would be a good idea to bring someone to campus who had a lot of experience working on elections and analyzing them.”

Begala has experience working as both a campaign manager and analyst.

Most notably, he worked with James Carville on Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential election campaign before going on to serve as a presidential consultant to Clinton. Until 2005, he co-hosted Crossfire, a CNN political debate show.
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Via NYTimes Magazine
By MARK LEIBOVICH

Chris Matthews, Seriously. (O.K., Not That Seriously.)

>As TVNewser/Fishbowl already reported on some quotes pertaining to this..

Senator Matthews? What next for the guy with all the ‘‘Hardball’’ questions — and answers? There is speculation that Matthews might challenge Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican, when he runs for re-election in 2010.

Whenever Chris Matthews says something he likes, which happens a lot, he repeats it often and at volumes suggesting a speaker who feels insufficiently listened to at times. “Tim Russert finally reeled the big marlin into the boat tonight,” Matthews yelled — nine times, on and off the air, after a Democratic debate that Russert moderated with Brian Williams in late February at Cleveland State University. Matthews believed that Russert (the fisherman) had finally succeeded in getting Hillary Clinton (the marlin) to admit that she was wrong to vote in favor of the Iraq war resolution in 2002. “We’ve been trolling for that marlin for what, a year now?” Matthews said to Russert.

Read all 9 pages at The New York Times.

Via Silicon Alley Insider
By Michael Learmonth
Booyah! Cramer Finally Signs With TheStreet.com (TSCM)

We’d been wondering when stock pundit Jim Cramer would end his contract deathmatch with TheStreet. Good news, Cramerica! Jim’s sticking around with the company he founded for another three years.

According to a TheStreet.com (TSCM) SEC filing Cramer’s deal gives him a nice pay bump: He’s getting a $1.3 million salary his first year, up from $750,000 last year. By the end of his contract, that base is scheduled to jump to $1.872 million. He can also pull down a bonus of up to 75% of his salary, and Jim gets another 300,000 shares of restricted stock to augment the 3.9 million shares he already owns.

That’s nice bump for Jim. But really? That’s it?

Jim doesn’t need the money: The former hedge fund manager and the most famous stock picker in the world, he has more money than God. Or at least plenty of money. And his salary on CNBC is thought to be in the $1 million range.
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Via PRNewsChannel.com
Drew Peterson to Appear on CNN’s ‘Larry King Live’ to Take Viewer Phone Calls
Peterson’s publicist says the public will get a chance to see who Drew Peterson really is this Friday at 9pm ET.

(PRNewsChannel) / Tampa, Fla. - Drew Peterson, the former Chicago-area police officer who’s the prime suspect in his wife’s disappearance, will be a guest on CNN’s Larry King Live and will take viewer phone calls, his publicist announced today.

Peterson will appear along with his criminal defense attorney Joel A. Brodsky.

“It all came together yesterday,” says Glenn Selig, Peterson’s Florida-based publicist.

Peterson and Brodsky appeared together recently on NBC’s Today. But the interview with host Larry King marks the first time Peterson will take live questions from callers.
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Via Engadget HD
By Darren Murph
Comcast rolls out four new HD channels in Richmond, VA

If you thought the HD rollouts from Comcast were dwindling down, you’ve got another thing coming. It appears that Richmond, Virginia will be picking up four newcomers as well on April 15th, notching AMC HD (218), CNN HD (234), History HD (237) and Animal Planet HD (241). Also of note, another foursome of channels — History Channel, Cartoon Network, G4TV and ION — have gone all digital. Got any more Comcast? We’re sure users all over the US would love to get in while you’re being generous.

Via Tallahassee Democrat
By Angeline J. Taylor
CNN reports on race from FAMU

What does it mean to be black in America? That’s the question scores of Florida A&M students answered Tuesday as part of a story being reported by CNN.

A CNN correspondent, producer and others traveled to FAMU on Sunday as part of a multicity tour of Historically Black Colleges and Universities that includes North Carolina Central, North Carolina A&T, Howard and Hampton universities.

“It was interesting in talking with students at FAMU. They were not only aware of the history behind the school, but I think also very aware of their place in the world and had very well thought out ideas of what it meant to be black in America,” said Chris Lawrence, a CNN correspondent from the Los Angeles bureau.

The reports from FAMU also will be included in a special report produced by CNN in July.
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Via EMQ
By Natalie Wilson, Black College Wire
Don’t Miss ‘Meeting David Wilson’ on MSNBC
Powerful documentary has surprising messages on race in America

One of the most unique challenges that Black people in America face is finding a true sense of ethnic identity that speaks to the double consciousness of what makes one African and American. The process of understanding the social experience of Black people in America has 28 year-old David Wilson on a quest to discover the true meaning of the term “African American.”

In the film “Meeting David Wilson” directed by David A. Wilson and Daniel J. Woolsey, Wilson discusses growing up in a ghetto of Newark, N.J., and realizing that he didn’t want to become a product of his environment.

Out of a sincere desire to find something more, he begins to research his family’s ancestry. From his research he finds that not only was he just three generations away from being a slave, but that the slaves in his family were owned by the prestigious Wilson family who operated tobacco plantations from North Carolina to Virginia.
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Via Newslab/Journal-isms (third item)
By Richard Prince
Juan Williams’ Title Changes to “Analyst” at NPR

Juan Williams, who has split his time being a senior correspondent at National Public Radio and a commentator on Fox News, is relinquishing his role as a “correspondent” at NPR so he may “pursue his many outside assignments and engagements, without any conflicts or limitations,” Ellen Weiss, NPR vice president for news, told NPR staffers and affiliates on Monday. Williams will be “one of our on-air news analysts.”

“I’m pretty honored that they would trust me like that,” Williams told Journal-isms. “It’s kind of unusual. Dan Schorr, Ted Koppel. That’s pretty nice company.”

Williams has offered strong opinions in his roles on Fox News and as author of a 2006 book, “Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America — and What We Can Do About It,” in which he criticized news subjects he must interview or report on as an NPR correspondent.
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