Dumb stories run all the time, but when they're played on the front page of the New York Times, they're going to echo significantly louder than they should.

There's no question that broadcasters are having trouble right now, just like every other advertiser-dependent medium. But Tim Arango's piece, "Broadcast TV Faces Struggle to Stay Viable," features so many glaring omissions I'd like to think some disconnected editor demanded it, and the reporter simply obliged.

Mostly, the article focuses on all the things that network TV has lost, but nothing that it's gained. There's no mention that the networks are controlled by major studios, which more often than not own -- and occasionally profit quite handsomely from -- the programs that they broadcast. There's no mention of TV programs being sold on DVD, which has helped cannibalize syndicated viewing but also offset some of those losses. Arango cites "Lost" but never mentions the robust demand for selected hits like that one abroad, with Disney (which produces it) receiving an especially lucrative license fee for the U.K. broadcast rights.

Instead, there are a lot of references to broadcast TV being a different animal now than it was in the days of "All in the Family" and "Hill Street Blues." Well, that's about as big a "duh" as there is.

Years ago, a network executive was bitching about a TV-related story in one of the Times -- I frankly forget if it was New York or L.A. -- and muttered to me, "If they're that naive about our business, you wonder what else they don't know."

Indeed, let's all hope the guys writing about the stimulus package have a better grasp on that than Saturday's story exhibited about network television.

Bill O'Reilly's eagerness to bash what he likes to call the "liberal media" has led to a bizarre distortion of reality in both his "Talking Points" and his latest column, titled "The End of Obama-Mania." But in the process the Fox News Channel host not only contradicts himself, he seems to throw some of his FNC colleagues under a bus as well.

While touting Fox News' solid post-election ratings, O'Reilly takes an extra step and argues that newspapers are struggling financially because "the folks" are "gravitating toward news agencies that seemingly tell it like it is. Committed left wing newspapers are folding in Seattle, Minneapolis and perhaps in San Francisco. The New York Times had to borrow money from a Mexican guy at 14% interest." Ole!

Except that newspapers' economic difficulties began long before the election. And the demand for news content online is actually at record levels. The real, well-documented problem is that papers haven't figured out how to monetize that web readership, which has been seriously exacerbated by the economic downturn in print. (For a pretty good backgrounder on where newspapers went wrong, read recovering journalist Joe Flint's blog item about the Rocky Mountain News folding on the Paley Center's website.)

 The truth is that O'Reilly has become so blinded by the "smear merchants" he sees behind every criticism of him that he keeps making utterly bogus connections. But the most interesting part of the column is his conclusion about right-leaning news sources. "Obama bashing doesn't do the folks much good, either. Why waste time on attacks, when information is what the folks need?" he writes, which sort of sounds like he doesn't even acknowledge the existence of his Fox compadres Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck, who are openly hostile toward the administration. Their ratings, after all, are up too. Is that because "the folks" simply want sources that will "tell it like it is," or (more likely) because "the folks" who are still smarting from the spanking they took during the election want somebody to reinforce their worldview? (Notably, several progressives/liberals responded to my earlier post about Fox's ratings saying they're watching the channel now just to savor the theater of listening to conservatives whine. In my review of Alexandra Pelosi's HBO documentary "Right America, Feeling Wronged," I likened this to taking pleasure in seeing the other team's cheerleaders cry after they lose the big game.)

O'Reilly is welcome to bask in the glory of his own ratings accomplishments, but he undermines his cause when he so obviously mangles the facts in order to lash out at his ever-growing enemies list. Because there's enough spin emanating from that quadrant of the "No-Spin Zone," frankly, to give you a throbbing headache.

Ah, this one sounds familiar: It's all the press' -- and specifically, Variety's -- fault.

Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Prez John Shaffner wrote members yesterday to reassure irate TV producers (see item below) that they're not being kicked out of the Emmy telecast. Yet, anyway.

Here's what the letter said, in part:

Over the past week, concern has been expressed over rumors which appeared in a Daily Variety story regarding this year’s Primetime Emmys®; some of you may not yet be aware of these rumors, which are based on the fear that the presentation of awards in various categories will be removed from the telecast.
 
In an effort to bring our entire membership up to date on this year’s Primetime Emmy Awards (which will air Sunday, September 20, on CBS), I would like to dispel these rumors and clarify the situation.
 
Here are the facts:
 
1) We have no intention to remove any of the TV movie, miniseries, variety/music/comedy specials and series categories from the Primetime Emmy Awards. There have been no such discussions with CBS.
 
2) The creative discussions underway with CBS concern a number of production suggestions with one goal in mind: to make the show as entertaining as possible.
 
3) These discussions are hypothetical — nothing will be resolved until after a producer is selected and he/she joins the discussion.

That, to put it mildly, is a nifty bit of parsing words. So here are the facts: The academy's board voted at their retreat in early February to remove a half-dozen categories from the live Emmy telecast, presenting them instead during a half-hour pre-show, and paring the total number of awards handed out during the three-hour broadcast to 21. No program categories were to be affected, so "best movie" and "best variety series" would still be in there. But related honors for writers, directors and performers -- with a special eye on the TV movie/miniseries categories -- were very much in play to be demoted. Part of the rationale for this is also outlined in the previous item.

Nothing is official yet because the academy wants to consult with CBS and whoever's named to produce the show, as well as analyze the nominations once they're announced to see which omissions make the most sense. Bottom line: If Al Pacino were nominated for "Angels in America," as he was a few years ago, they'd find a way to keep that in the main show.

Governors, by the way, were asked to sign confidentiality agreements, since the academy knew that if word got out prematurely they'd face a backlash that they weren't prepared to deal with yet. Sorry about that, but hey, that's what we do for a living over here, so our needs to report the news take precedence over your desire not to be inconvenienced.

While nobody likes receiving hostile emails, the fact that the academy is contemplating changes that will piss off part of its membership doesn't justify distorting what's happened thus far to defuse the controversy. And that "we have no intention" line is certainly misleading. Maybe "we have no concrete plans yet" would be more accurate, but I don't get paid enough to give free PR lessons.

Not enough people saw "Frost/Nixon," so here's a reminder: The cover-up is often worse than the original crime.

Change seldom occurs easily or without complaint when it comes to award shows, and the Emmys are no exception.

Helen Verno, exec VP of movies & miniseries at Sony Pictures Television, has called plans that would move some TV movie categories out of the main Emmy telecast and into an adjacent pre-show "an outrage," and urged others who work in the TV movie biz to register their objections. A veritable who's who of TV movie producers (no need to go through all their credits here, but feel free to look them up on imdb.com) have written to the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences to voice their concerns.

Personally, I have somewhat mixed feelings about this campaign -- or at least can see both sides of this issue. The Emmys embarrassed themselves the last time around in part by pandering to reality TV. That said, reality has become a major element of primetime television, while the TV movie has been in decline -- certainly in terms of volume, and often in terms of creative ambitions.

As a consequence, establishing which awards are handed out live comes down to a question of priorities -- namely, are the Emmys about honoring excellence, or is the foremost goal to put on a good show that will attract solid ratings (and not incidentally, younger demographics), thus making the networks that televise the awards happy? It's worth noting, too, the networks that share broadcasting the Emmys on a rotating basis (that is, ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox) have dramatically reduced their movie production, so they have less interest in seeing movie categories represented. In other words, they'd rather have "Dancing With the Stars" or "Survivor" out there than some HBO movie or PBS miniseries.

While I sympathize with the pickle in which Emmy organizers find themselves, the passion of these TV movie veterans deserves a forum (plus, it lets others write my blog for me, which appeals to my slacker instinct). So I asked producers to copy me on their messages to the academy. Here's a sampling:

* "As a member of the Academy, and a producer of made for television movies for the past twenty years, I strongly object to the removal of long form awards from the televised portion of the program. Made for television movies and mini-series have proven not only to achieve high ratings, but have historically attracted major film actors to television. Just two quick recent examples include Robert Duvall in Broken Trail and Susan Sarandon and Ralph Fiennes in Bernard and Doris." -- Diane Sokolow

* "As a long-time Academy member and three-time Emmy nominee, I am quite upset to learn that the Academy is considering moving the longform Emmy Awards out of the primetime telecast. Longform television has always been a prime staple of network and cable television. The programming is the most expensive per hour and often most complicated to produce (especially well) of all primetime programming. It is the vehicle which attracts the most prestigious and accomplished acting and directing talent in the business. And of course many of the biggest stars in the business who attend the Emmy broadcast, do so because they are longform nominees. I urge you to continue to keep the longform Emmy awards in the telecast." -- Larry Sanitsky

* "Television movies and miniseries should certainly be part of the Emmy telecast. These films are often the best, most watched and most distinctive and distinguished programs on the air. If there's any hope of maintaining audience interest in quality programming, the Academy must recognize and promote these television movies and minis. Denying them on-air exposure is dismissive and demeaning to those professionals who worked so hard to get them made and who've spent so much of their time and money to make them good." -- Frank Konigsberg

* "I made my first Television Movie in 1973. It was a 90-minute Hallmark Hall of Fame. They're still around. I'm still around. I paid my TV Academy dues all these years. And what do I get? Extirpated from the Emmys! At least I get all the good theatricals from my membership in the Motion Picture Academy. Clever ideas like this one usually come from the Federal Bureacracy. Congratulations! After 120 movies, 3 series, 5 features, 1 animated series, and various other stuff you, not the networks and cable companies as we all thought would be the case, have made me irrelevant, sent me to an ignoble, anonymous death." -- Michael Jaffe

* "This is most unfortunate and self-defeating decision and an insult to those of us still fortunate enough and passionate enough to continue producing Made for Television Movies. I seriously hope this decision will be reconsidered and overturned." -- Linda Kent

* "I was heartbroken to learn the academy is considering removing movies and miniseries from the televised Emmys. I must tell you I grew up watching television like millions of Americans and my favorite memories were when the networks broadcast the longform. From 'Roots' to 'Brian's Song' it was these movie moments that inspired me to become a producer/writer in television, and I was blessed when I was able to stand on your stage and accept the Emmy for Best Picture for 'Door To Door.' I would not have been there if not for the movies I watched and the movies the Academy honored through the years. I cannot imagine an Emmy telecast without these movies being honored, and despite what the leaders at the network have done to devalue a longform one thing is certain...the audience loves them and will continue to till the end of time." -- Dan Angel

* "As a writer who was twice nominated for the Emmy in the TV-movie category ... I wish to strongly add my voice to those protesting the possible removal of the TV-movie/miniseries awards from the televised portion of the Emmy presentations. What an absurd notion! TV movies are not the stepchildren of the industry. We deserve to go to the ball with all the other grown-ups. It's not that we want to be on TV so we can wave to Mom. It's the principle of the thing!" -- Anna Sandor

At a Caucus for Producers, Writers & Directors panel on Feb. 25, two TV movie executives -- Sony Pictures Television exec VP Helen Verno and Hallmark Channel original programming senior VP Barbara Fisher -- both said that their companies were looking at the feasibility of doing some more home-grown production due to California's new tax-incentive program.

Runaway production has sent most of the TV-movie biz migrate to faraway locales, especially Canada, reducing work opportunities for below-the-line personnel as well as supporting and background actors. The tax credit would commit $100 million a year to try luring production to California and away from other countries and states like New Mexico, Louisiana and Michigan that have aggressively courted the industry.

TV movies alone wouldn't be enough to offset what's already been lost, but with local feature film production at a low point since those figures began being monitored by Film LA in 1993, any infusion of work into the region would certainly be a welcome boon to the local economy. The only real growth area has been reality TV, and renting out a mansion for a dating show doesn't exactly provide much of a boost compared to dramatic fare.

*  *  *

In an unrelated aside, Fisher also had a very funny line at the caucus panel, referring to the parade of older performers that have traditionally starred in Hallmark's family-oriented movies -- including 92-year-old Ernest Borgnine, who played the lead in the 2007 movie "A Grandpa for Christmas."

In contrast to the youth movement that's prevalent elsewhere and the preoccupation with the adults 18-49 demographic, she quipped, "If we get somebody 55, we go, 'Woo, we've got a youngster in our movie!"

News Corp. Chief Rupert Murdoch has gotten a lot of crap from all the expected quarters regarding his love of newspapers, but as someone who works in print, it's just kind of nice to see anybody exhibit that kind of enthusiasm for the medium.

As Variety reported, Murdoch -- undaunted by the drag that the Wall Street Journal has been inflicting on News Corp.'s balance sheet -- might be interested in making a play for the Los Angeles Times, which continues to suffer under the stewardship of the bankruptcy-declaring, ax-wielding, journalism-hating Sam Zell's Tribune Co.

Analysts, of course, hate the idea, but as a veteran Murdoch watcher, I've always been impressed by his willingness to tell them to bugger off, pursuing assets with true synergy in mind that could potentially yield 2 + 2 = 5 -type benefits. Then again, that's in part because he understands the ability of (and isn't afraid to use) media assets to pummel enemies and reward friends, underscored by his stewardship of the New York Post.

In some respects, a dismal stock price might actually be liberating for Murdoch. With virtually every studio's stock in the tank, he can pursue bigger-picture endeavors, gambling that they'll pay off down the road, if not necessarily in the next quarterly earnings report.

Granted, this might all be a bad idea, but at a time when the media business is in such a state of flux, it could also be an opportunistic stroke of genius. Either way, as someone working in a seemingly dying profession -- watching newspapers commit the equivalent of slow-motion suicide -- it's interesting to see a media mogul wonder if the unabated demand for print content, and its disproportionate influence over the lazy electronic media, possesses unseen (or at least underrated) value.

Contemplating all this in the context of Murdoch's commitment to advance his children throughthe ranks of his company -- even if that meant losing an able lieutenant like Peter Chernin -- leaves me asking just one question: Rupert, whether or not this Times thing pans out, is it OK if I call you dad?

Not to pat myself on the back (OK, maybe a little), but this was easily predictable the day after the election -- and even more so as President Obama's inauguration approached: Conservative talk hosts, or at least those who anchor Fox News Channel's lineup, are enjoying a solid post-election bump.

Bill O'Reilly -- not a self-professed conservative, but clearly more antagonistic toward what he calls "secular-progressives" than any other political constituency -- was up 33% in February compared to the previous year, averaging 3.6 million viewers in just-issued Nielsen data. Sean Hannity -- an unapologetic pit bull for the right -- rose 38% (to nearly 2.8 million) now that he's shed former co-host Alan Colmes and, along with Rush Limbaugh, picked up the mantle for the GOP cause while proclaiming his radio show "conservatism in exile." And Fox has further burnished its openly conservative credentials with the addition of Glenn Beck -- one of the least sophisticated voices in the cable space, who started in January and has doubled his timeslot.

Granted, like all the cable news channels, Fox still skews heavily toward those over age 55, but it's overall gains have included solid increases among adults 25-54 -- the prime currency for news ad rates, which should put a smile on the face of Fox News CEO Roger Ailes. It's no secret that Ailes and outgoing News Corp. CEO Peter Chernin were never particularly close, and the strong performance by FNC should ensure that others within the News empire tread cautiously in encroaching on Ailes' fiefdom.

The one potential negative is that Fox risks narrowing its lens -- becoming a balm to those still angry over the election results, resentful about Obama's victory and ranting about socialism -- while excluding more of the moderates and liberals that the channel attracted. Frankly, when I turned to FNC not long ago and heard Hannity still railing about the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers, it was hard not to think, "Geez, dude, let it go. We've got bigger fish to fry."

Still, when a relatively small slice of the U.S. population like 2.4 million viewers (Fox's overall primetime average in February -- a 28% year-to-year improvement) can tower over the direct cable-news competition in total audience, you needn't please all the people all the time. And fortunately, when it comes to delivering eyeballs media buyers don't quibble about little things -- beginning with how bitter they might be.

Update: O'Reilly addressed Fox's post-election ratings on his program in the "Talking Points" opening on Feb. 26, but he appeared to draw the wrong conclusion. "Americans are worried, and they want the truth," he said, attacking the usual targets -- NBC News, the New York Times -- in his self-serving argument that nobody can expect "real" news for those left-leaning sources.

Perhaps that's parly responsible for FNC's rise, but another source seems considerably more likely: Americans who can't believe that their side lost, and who look to Fox News for reinforcement of their views and reassurance.

Now that I've had a chance to read a lot more of the post-Oscar coverage, a few additional thoughts:

* As tvtattle.com cleverly noted, reviews of the show were all over the map: "Best Oscars in years," "worst ever," etc. Everyone has a right to his or her opinion, but it's hard to escape the sense that journalists feel extra pressure these days to issue bold, sweeping proclamations in order to get attention. Saying something is "a little better than most, not as good as some," or vice versa, might be accurate, but that isn't the kind of headline that's going to generate a Drudge link.

 * A producer I know (who will remain anonymous) made what I thought was a pretty interesting point: "I thought the real unspoken loser last night were people like Jon Stewart. I thought last night (which was terrific) was all of show business taking back their big night from the likes of a cable comedian and his snarky, New York writing staff.  And God bless Danny Boyle for essentially saying as much on-air.  And given the debacle of last year's Emmys, this couldn't have come at a better time."

While I don't completely agree with that appraisal (I thought Stewart was fine, and far from the problem), it does make one assertion that might very well be true: That the Oscars should unabashedly celebrate movies and be hosted by a movie star. Writer-producer Ken Levine echoed this point in an item on the Huffington Post.

Tapping comics like Stewart or Chris Rock has been emblematic of the "Let's appeal to a younger audience" imperative, whereas this approach basically said, "Here we are -- big, glossy and unapologetic. Take it or leave it."

* Having done this for a few years, nobody is really meant to sit and intently view the Oscars for 3 1/2 hours straight unless they're A) surrounded by people drinking; B) paid to; or C) in the market for an impossibly expensive size-0 evening gown. That's probably why some critics sound particularly bitchy. Still, I always wonder when there's extra griping about award shows being "long" or "silly" or "self-important" -- "Um, have you ever actually watched one of these things before?" That's sort of a given. Just to be fair, the finished product has to be considered in context.

* Preliminary results based solely on overnight metered markets show a 6% ratings increase over last year. (Nielsen's fast-national ratings will be issued after noon Pacific time.)

Update: OK, yee-ha, so the fast nationals came a little early: ABC reports that the Oscar audience actually rose 11% in total viewers, to an average of 36.3 million, and 13% among the key demo of adults 18-49.

Any improvement is good these days, though at least some of that bump over the low-rated 2008 Oscarcast is likely attributable to a more popular group of movies, including the inevitable Heath Ledger/"The Dark Knight" tribute. It does, however, seem to endorse one strategy -- keeping elements of the show secret in an effort to build interest and suspense.

* The arrivals coverage has sunk to all-time lows, with virtually no discussion of the movies themselves. OK, we get it, the powers that be have decided that it's primarily women who are watching, and that they care disproportionately about fashion. You know, we don't want to fill their pretty little heads with too many thoughts or anything in between Revlon commercials.

Yet it's insulting, frankly, to have Kate Winslet standing there and not be able to ask one question about her acting, as ABC and local KABC-TV gush-bag George Pennacchio did, instead waxing on about how great she looks (duh) and whether she's nervous (double duh). Pennacchio was so effusive about Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's humanitarian efforts that even they were looking at him like, "Dude, get a grip."

At least back when Roger Ebert used to join Pennacchio on the red carpet there was some give-and-take about the movies. Now it's just a race to see how fast the hosts can crawl up the talent's skirts and pants legs.

* Let the culture wars begin! Well, that didn't take long -- from the web page for the second hour of Bill O'Reilly's syndicated radio show: "Big wins for the movie 'Milk' put gay rights and gay marriage back on the front burner, and that is just the way Hollywood likes it. We'll talk about the how and why of Hollywood's politics." Actually, it's rather a transparent way for cable news and talkradio to piggyback on the Oscars and inject pop culture into their shows by deriding those "Hollywood pinheads," but knock yourself out, gang.

* Now that the show's finally over, can the LA Times please re-seal "The Envelope" -- maybe with Tom O'Neil inside it -- until, oh, next December?

Bill Condon and Laurence Mark will be closely scrutinized for this Sunday's Oscar telecast, but the producers have already exhibited one bit of questionable judgment: Wasting time before the awards having lunch with the Los Angeles Times' resident pompous blowhard, Patrick Goldstein.

Goldstein sounded his latest "Oh no, the Oscar telecast might stink" alarms in his most recent column, while casually mentioning that Condon and Mark had lunch with him the other day.

Really? Like, they didn't have better things to do?

Remember, this is the same guy that couldn't even be bothered to actually sit through the 2008 awards. Or to quote from Goldstein's post-Oscar column last year: "Here's how we watched the Oscars in my household: We TiVo-ed the broadcast, came back from Little League practice, hopped in bed with some snacks and zapped through the commercials, the musical numbers and most of the craft awards, giving our full attention to (Jon) Stewart's routines, the clip compilations and the big awards and acceptance speeches, starting with best animated feature. Total elapsed time: one hour, 45 minutes, tops."

Wow, talk about commitment. And this is supposedly the Times' ace movie columnist. Seriously, he couldn't skip Little League practice (at 5 p.m. on a Sunday, by the way? Wonder when they play the actual games) on Oscar night?

Granted, I might be a little extra sensitive since Goldstein continues to deride studios for spending any money on Oscar campaigning -- as if "For your consideration" ads are especially unsavory compared to Hollywood's other ego-stroking activities -- at a time when both my newspaper and his are struggling in the face of cutbacks and a dismal economy. Besides, lobbying for awards has been part of a delicate eco-system that actually supports the kind of prestige movies that Goldstein professes to care about. (For another take, see A.O. Scott's New York Times piece.)

Meanwhile, the Times keeps shrinking -- a far cry from those days when the paper was so fat that the Sunday edition was reputed to have squashed a small dog, or so the story (likely apocryphal) went. Today's Times would have a hard time mashing a slug.

At any rate, I'll be reviewing Sunday's show, and I'm going into that process with an open mind. As for Goldstein, if he wants the full, unbridled experience, here's a crazy thought: Try watching the whole thing.

In the years I've been a journalist, nothing has evoked a more vehement response than an October 2000 piece I wrote for the Los Angeles Times about the remarkable amount of TV production going on in Vancouver at the time. What probably riled people most, frankly, was the cover story's headline, which I didn't write, which said, "Vancouver: If you were here, you'd be working now."

Actors, location managers and any number of other below-the-line workers didn't take kindly to what they saw as a flippant response to their loss of livelihood, and I've been especially sensitive to their plight ever since. Yet for all that, it's difficult to tell whether California's belated attempt to provide tax incentives to film in Los Angeles will yield the desired benefits, especially with movie production having fled almost entirely, both to foreign locales and states like Michigan, New Mexico and Louisiana, which have aggressively sought to woo them.

Oddly, as Variety's story about the provision notes, the apparent straw that broke the camel's back was "Ugly Betty" leaving L.A. for New York, in which case it's hard not to wonder what took the legislature so long to get mad. The reality is that even with Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor politicians didn't want to look like they were cozying up to Hollywood, not realizing that it's not just the studios but thousands of their constituents and local businesses that would reap the rewards from more production staying in L.A. county.

With the economy so tight, I suspect studios will still be drawn to the cheapest locations they can find. Still, as the nonprofit FilmL.A. noted in its bleak report in January, movie production has hit a low since those numbers began being tracked in 1993, and shooting reality TV shows here -- renting out Hollywood Hills mansions for MTV dating shows -- doesn't yield the same financial returns as a scripted series or big-budget movie. (The full report is available on their website.) 

Bottom line: It was time to at least try doing something about it. The problem is that the political class spent so much time worrying about the appearance of kissing up to the studios that they kissed off home-grown production.

Having apparently run out of Americans to kill in its procedural dramas, CBS is doing its part to support the North American Free Trade Agreement by importing more fresh corpses from Canada. With "Flashpoint," the series devoted to an elite emergency task force, pulling in respectable ratings on Fridays, the network announced that it was picking up another Canadian cop show, "The Bridge."

CBS' description of the series is as follows: "'The Bridge' is inspired by the insights of veteran insider and outspoken former Toronto police union head, Craig Bromell. It's a procedural crime drama through the unique lens of a charismatic and dynamic union leader who is battling criminals on the street and fighting his own bosses, and sometimes corruption in the ranks, to protect his fellow officers." Moreover, Canadian cops (see photo of "Flashpoint") still look pretty much like American cops (see remainder of CBS dramas).

Beyond doing its part for cross-border North American relations, there has to be a drinking game in this mini-Canadian invasion somewhere -- something like taking a swig every time you hear the hint of a French accent or someone saying"aboot" instead of "about."

Sounds pretty good, eh? Drink up, hockey lovers!

My expectations weren't particularly high for "The Rotten Tomatoes Show on Current," Current TV's latest series, which will premiere on March 5. Yet it's a pretty fresh (pardon the expression), breezy, not surprisingly snarky look at movies that seems to seamlessly fit with the Fox Interactive Media-owned movie-review site's brand as well as the cable channel's youthful demographic.

The show is hosted by Brett Erlich and comedienne Ellen Fox, and as a rule when one of these things is fronted by a comic you've never heard of that's seldom a good sign. But the sample they sent over -- reviewing "Punisher: War Zone," admittedly a big ripe (sorry again) target -- was funny and wove in a diverse array of opinions using chintzy-looking web videos in addition to the hosts. The real shocker, though, was that there was actually some context -- pointing out that this was the third try at adapting the character and weaving in clips of the earlier Dolph Lundgren and Thomas Jane versions of the Marvel vigilante. Favorite line: Erlich said when he asked for a ticket, the guy behind the counter said, "Really?" Hey, been there, done that.

Frankly, the series achieves some of the tone that Disney's syndication unit doubtless wanted to achieve in its makeover of "At the Movies," which sought to have it both ways -- incorporating younger hosts (Ben Lyons, Ben Mankiewicz) but still largely aping the "Siskel & Ebert" format. The problem is that Lyons' criticism is so banal that they have the worst of both worlds -- no sizzle to go with no steak.(Mankiewicz enjoys a modicum of residual good will with me because of his work on Turner Classic Movies, but he can't redeem what's become a real mess, at a time when criticism is already under siege as newspapers shed critics.)

The new Current show is also, inevitably, perfect fodder to be sliced and diced into smaller components for viewing on the Current and rottentomatoes websites. Produced by Jeff Plunkett, the series premiere will tackle "Street Fighter," "Assassination of a High School President" and "Crossing Over."

So with apologies to Rotten Tomatoes for referencing a rival website, if I was forced to assign a Metacritic score to the show I'd give it a 65 or a 70 -- the disclaimer being in comparison to "At the Movies," the bar isn't set that high on avoiding a big fat splat.

Update: A few additional notes that I wasn't completely clear about in my first post: Yes, the show will feature the average "tomato-meter" score that rottentomatoes derives from scanning reviews of each movie, though from what I saw the program doesn't reach out to major critics to include their voices. But again, this was just a sample of one movie. For additional information about the show check out their website.

And in response to a reader, I also generally prefer Metacritic, although the numerical values that they assign to reviews can often be surprisingly off, at least based on my own experiences with them. That said, I do find their chart more useful for a quick thumb-nail sketch of the overall critical response than rottentomatoes.

Against my better judgment, I attended the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp.'s 2009-10 Economic Forecast and Industry Outlook on Wednesday morning, and it was every bit as depressing as you might imagine.

Despite the economic stimulus package, the forecasters (and seriously, let's take everything with a grain of salt here based on past performance) predicted that it would take quite awhile to begin to yield any discernible benefits. LACEDC Chief economist Jack Kyser estimated that unemployment in the county will peak at 10.6% in 2010. Looking fora bright spot, the only glint of good news is that the huge decline in home values has made them more affordable to first-time buyers -- though not to existing home owners, since us poor dumb bastards would need to sell our own depreciated houses in order to purchase another.

Although I was rather flattered to be asked to present an appraisal of the entertainment industry, it occurred to me that might be because no self-respecting economist would dare show his face after having been so wildly off in past projections. This observation did not get an especially big laugh from the room, but at least I wasn't stoned to death, which struck me as a possible option.

Kyser generally agreed with my assessmentof the entertainment sector -- that the industry is in a serious state of flux, and that runaway production has essentially become (to quote Film LA) "ran-away production" -- with movies having largely fled to cheaper locales, dropping local film production to its lowest levels since Film LA's tally began in 1993. Jay Leno's move to primetime, meanwhile, represents an ominous sign for the TV production community, and when I asked this fairly well-heeled (or at least well-dressed) gathering how many of them had already purchased a Blu-ray DVD player only a smattering of hands went up, so that might not be the industry's savior, either.

Other presentations were equally gloomy. Mark Liberman, president-CEO of LA Inc. The LA Convention & Visitors Bureau, anticipated a 4.3% decline in L.A. tourism and the lowest hotel-occupancy rates since 2003. Michael Niemira, chief economist of the International Council of Shopping Centers, added, "Consumers have cut back on discretionary purchases of all kinds," which explains why I have yet to buy a "Watchmen" T-shirt.

As far as I can tell, the only enterprise making any money is the downtown Marriott, which fleeced conference attendees to the tune of $13 to park there.

Speakers were asked to offer at least a ray of hope. Lacking that, I said maybe I can keep any political aspirations that I might harbor alive by assuring everyone that while hope might be a bit of a reach, "There will be change."

Critics can drive themselves bonkers reading what's written about their reviews online. That said, I can't resist a special shout-out to Joss Whedon fans, who have officially devoted more analysis to the premiere of Fox's "Dollhouse" than should ever be showered on a show that registered less than 5 million viewers.

Similarly, it was hard not to take note of this response on Variety's website to my review of "Spectacular!," a teen musical that recently premiered on Nickelodeon:

"This was a terrible review. I absolutally (sic) LOVED the movie Spectacular! and i absolutally (sic) HATED High School Musical 1-3! They were terrible, unlike Spectacular! i really loved this movie and would love for it to come out on dvd for me! [: in the meantime. toughen up and get your facts straight. Spectacular IS a GREAT MOVIE. So you take your little right butt (sic?) and write bad reviews about something terrible ... like HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 1-3. Thank you. Have a nice day. -Kenzie P.S. LEARN TO WRITE GOOD REVIEWS."

Frankly, I appreciate the career advice. But more seriously, the message reflects an increasingly common mentality that has crept into our discourse as programming becomes more fragmented and tailored to narrow niches -- namely, "If you don't like what I do, we don't just disagree, but you're wrong. Please correct your opinion."

Kids, perhaps (and I'm making an assumption here about Kenzie), are to be forgiven for embracing this mind-set, but it's all-too-prevalent among adults, reflecting a real deficiency in terms of critical thinking. It's the kind of self-absorbed reasoning, frankly, that has helped poison our political discourse and injected extra belligerence into the ongoing conversation in cyberspace. The nonprofit forum Zocalo, notably, will tackle this very topic by hosting an upcoming panel in March titled, "The Age of Rage: Is the Internet Making Us Mean?"

Of course, the Internet isn't exclusively to blame, but is it a contributing factor? Absolutally.

Apparently, I wasn't the only one struck by the simultaneous media coming-out parties of Nadya Suleman and Chesley Sullenberger, which I discussed in my latest column titled "TV News Goes Soft During Hard Times." (I didn't write the headline, but it perfectly sums up the piece while adding a nice double entendre, so kudos to the copy desk gang.)
For other takes rooted in the same unsavory media stew -- each with a slightly different angle on this odd juxtaposition of sudden celebrity -- see:
- Los Angeles Times TV critic Mary McNamara's direct connection of the octuplet mom and the "hero pilot," appropriately headlined "A Crash Course in Fame."
- Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan's typically thirsty for the good ol' days, "It's morning in America" take on the financial crisis, which at the end ties in Suleman and Sullenberger along with a lot of flowery prose. Noonan, as usual, takes the long way around before turning Sullenberger into John Wayne -- proof that America still turns out heroes -- and Suleman into a cautionary tale of where America might be heading, more about selfishness than delivering litters of children.
- Finally, here's a recommendation for Joe Queenan's Saturday guest piece in the Journal, which manages to omit Sullenberger and Suleman but zeroes in on the likes of Michael Phelps, Joaquin Phoenix and baseball's Alex Rodriguez to examine our preoccupation with the inconsequential. Queenan delivers the key passage about all this to my mind, which is as follows: "We the public think that we know these people because we see them all the time on TV. Because of this, they root us in the here and now in a way run-of-the-mill white-collar villains do not. They have violated an old-fashioned code of morality that we can all understand in a way that we cannot understand a $50 billion Ponzi scheme or the fact that Iceland has put out a 'Closed for Business' sign."

Read separately, each column fritters around a different aspect of the same issue. Read together, the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle fall into place in a more interesting way.

A Postscript on weekend reading: The weekend's biggest head-scratcher had to be the story in the New York Times about whether the success of "Slumdog Millionaire" might herald a comeback of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire." Although there's no evidence this is going to happen (the show's producer says sure, he'd like to bring it back; ABC says nothing at all), the Times gave the fishing expedition prominent placement. There's a lot of that particular virus going around these days, which is generally symptomatic of A) editors over-reaching; B) reporters who are a little too eager to please; C) slimmed-down newspapers having fewer people to edit stories and ask the right questions; D) all of the above.

You shouldn't need to use your "phone a friend" to answer this one.

As a proud UCLA graduate, I can't let the Hollywood Reporter item about the E! network producing a reality TV special titled "Hot Girls in Scary Places" -- featuring a trio of USC cheerleaders competing for a whopping $10,000 -- pass without a few thoughts.

The special will feature "three USC cheer squad friends challenged to spend the night in a supposedly haunted abandoned hospital," per THR, competing for 10 grand.

Let the jokes begin:

- I think this show already exists. It's called "Grey's Anatomy." (RIM SHOT!)

- If this works, will they do a USC-themed sequel titled "Heisman Trophy Winners in Scary Places?" Because if they do, I can think of one really good candidate for that.

- Wow, a whole $10,000? That's almost, like, 25 percent of a semester's tuition at USC. (Too true to merit a rim shot).

- Did someone from USC come up with this idea? Because technically, the hospital isn't abandoned if there are three people inside, is it?

- Wouldn't it make more sense, strictly on a voyeuristic level, to do a show called "Scary Girls in Hot Places?" At least that could double as a travel program.

- The special is supposed to premiere March 13. Good news! At least USC's basketball team won't have to worry about playing that night, since they'll have been knocked out of the Pac-10 tournament the day before!

- Why only three cheer squad members? What, are the others busy studying or something? (Almost snorted milk out my nose on that one.)

Thank you for your indulgence (BL, UCLA, Class of '84).

Is it just me, or are all those "Watchmen" ads blitzing the airwaves, like, the best thing on television right now?

OK, this is huge geek thing, but having read the incredibly dense graphic novel, count me among the many who assumed that the Alan Moore-Dave Gibbons epic  could never be properly done as a movie. Yet director Zack Snyder's imagery appears to have virtually plucked panels off the page and, remarkably, transported them directly to the screen.

Frankly, I'm still skeptical that this can work as a movie, if only because the tone of the 1986 comic is so overwrought. Scenes and dialog that were perfectly acceptable on the printed page could easily sound risible on film, which explains why both "The Hulk" movies largely steered away from moments when the over-sized green guy said "Hulk Smash!" in a big throaty voice.

Perhaps that's why the commercials for "Watchmen" are so striking -- and, actually, might be as good as this ever gets. Pulling off the movie -- with so many characters to introduce, the elaborate whodunit story arc and the flashbacks to these heroes in their heyday -- still seems like an enormously tricky proposition. The ads and trailer, by contrast, are pretty spectacular.

One thing seems certain: Snyder has already earned well-deserved admiration in comic-book/sci-fi circles for the dazzling visual style that he brought to Frank Miller's "300," with nary a laugh in the wrong place. If he can repeat that feat and make "Watchmen" worthy of its trailer, well, the standing ovation at next summer's Comic-Con -- from fans, Warner Bros. and every other studio that has a piece of the action -- might not stop until Christmas.

For those charting the current path of big-brain television, Wednesday was a pretty damn impressive night. First (at least if you're on an East Coast feed), FX's "Damages" took a quantum leap forward with an extremely strong episode that finally began to firmly pull its disparate plot threads together. Then "Lost" did much the same, after a few moments where the ABC show's time-travel plot appeared that it could easily careen into a black hole, or wormhole, or whatever.

"Damages" has benefited enormously from its cast additions this season, as well as the return of Ted Danson's character, Arthur Frobisher, in this latest episode. The beefed-up cast -- including Marcia Gay Harden as a rival attorney to Glenn Close's pivotal plaintiff's lawyer Patty Hewes -- has helped obscure some of the deficiencies apparent in the Emmy-nominated first season.

As for "Lost" (and see my colleague Cynthia Littleton's blog for a more thorough analysis), the only bummer is that this latest installment took a ratings hit opposite a two-hour "American Idol." While DVR viewing should make up some of that loss, the show risks losing viewers as its twisty plot becomes more "Wait, who the hell is that again, and how did he get there?" demanding.

Still, as I stated in my earlier review, there are only 30-some-odd hours of "Lost" left, and the show has thus far given its core fans reason to savor them.

Wow, Sean Hannity got what has to be the very last interview with disgraced Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich and then spent the next several minutes -- including his "Great American Panel" -- congratulating himself over how much new ground he'd broken. Fortunately, Deborah Norville and Juan Williams joined in patting Hannity on the back, mostly so he didn't risk hurting his shoulder doing it himself.

Hannity then segued into a segment he calls "The Media Mash," going after other news outlets. It's a classic ploy to bond himself more closely to his audience -- repeatedly telling them that his is the only voice they can trust. There's interesting evidence of how well this approach works, by the way, in this week's "Right America: Feeling Wronged -- Some Voices From the Campaign Trail," Alexandra Pelosi's latest HBO documentary, which captures Hannity not surprisingly being treated like a rock star at a McCain-Palin rally.

On the plus side, there was a nifty symmetry to the Hannity-Blagojevich encounter -- a face-off between two self-obsessed, fast-talking dark-haired guys with expensive haircuts. Don't look now, but I think they've finally found a worthy replacement for Alan Colmes.

NBC News' Ann Curry spent much of her interview with Nadya Suleman -- the new mother of octuplets, and 14 kids in all -- hectoring her about how she was going to afford all this. But who's kidding whom?

NBC noted with the usual indignation that it didn't pay Suleman for the interview. But the network that practically turned "To Catch a Predator" into an ongoing series undoubtedly pussyfooted around that distinction by shelling out money to license all those photos that it used, justifying the outlay with a special "Dateline" on Tuesday night after multiple installments of Suleman's blather on the "Today" show. Why broadcasters insist that they don't pay for interviews -- when everyone knows what a sordid business this has become -- is at this point a mystery.

The "Dateline" segment wasn't content with just Suleman, though, but expanded its lens to include "interviewing" her young children, including a five-year-old son. Any news outlet would have seized the interview with Suleman, but there's a big difference between exposing the mother and dragging her minor children into the circus' center ring, even if she doesn't possess the good sense to shield them. (Here's a clip from the interview.)

"People are not trying to judge you," Curry reassured Suleman at one point, which is patent nonsense. Some of us, however, are also judging NBC News, and first impressions of the way it handled this latest big "get" are almost equally unflattering.

UPDATE: NBC continues to unequivocally deny that any money changed hands with Suleman. Here's the quote NBC News spokeswoman Allison Gollust gave mediabistro.com/tvnewser: "NBC News does not pay for interviews. We did not pay Nadya Suleman, or anyone who represents her, for our interview. We didn't license a single photo or video from her, or anyone who represents her. Not a dime. I cannot be more clear about this. There is no deal with anyone at NBC Universal — not at NBC News, not at Bravo. No one."

That would be extremely refreshing if true in this case, though given all the networks' track record in tap-dancing around the payment issue, let's just say I remain skeptical.

As a one-time Howard Stern listener who didn't follow him to satellite radio, my first thought reading about Sirius XM Radio's possible bankruptcy filing -- beyond the haughty way in which Sirius XM CEO Mel Karmazin turned his nose up at reporters back when he was at CBS -- was that the much-ballyhooed $500-million deal for the self-proclaimed "King of All Media," in the final analysis, didn't work.

Yes, the central core of Stern acolytes came with him, but there simply weren't enough of them -- given the profligate spending in the satellite-radio bidding wars -- to justify the kind of insane dollars thrown his way. And while all forms of media are struggling to stay above water in the current environment, Stern's big talk about launching a brave new medium and simultaneously bringing terrestrial radio to its knees sounds especially hollow now based on the way things have played out.

Stern has reached the point where he can do pretty well whatever he wants, including nothing. But that big booming voice that once accompanied me on my morning commute -- the one that boasted roughly 8 million listeners a week, bestsellers and even a reasonably successful movie -- has been reduced to little more than a whisper in the larger media scheme of things.

Too bad. Though I suspect if the old Stern that I remember were talking about some other rich dude who vacated a lofty perch, grabbed the big bucks and wound up at a company that finally filed for bankruptcy, he'd call the guy a big douche.

It's too bad that ABC was forced to squander a solid episode of "Desperate Housewives" -- which is actually in the midst of a pretty terrific season creatively -- up against the Grammy Awards on Sunday night. But a few things about the hour should be mentioned.

Interestingly, the show weighed in directly on the terrible economy, exploring the strain that financial troubles can take on relationships in the suburbs. There was also a credible thread about how Susan (Teri Hatcher) and Mike (James Denton) were going to afford private school for their kid. The episode underscored that TV can respond to such matters with far more immediacy than movies, subtly and not-so-subtly addressing people's concerns in the context of ongoing series.

Yet the timeliness of that plot was offset by the irony of containing one of the clunkiest product-placement sequences in recent memory. Specifically, Bree (Marcia Cross) shows up with a shiny new car that's the envy of her struggling friend Lynette (Felicity Huffman). It's a Lexus! And to reinforce the point, the sequence not only highlights the car's many wonderful features but ends with a shot that zooms in on the Lexus logo.

Hey, I get it -- desperate times call for desperate measures. But the product-placement thing breaks down precisely at that moment when you're completely conscious of the fact that you're being sold something. By that measure, ABC and the producers have let their "Housewives" look a little too desperate.

One would think that escaping the tyranny of television would be a blessing, but the Writers Guild Awards could use a little of the discipline that a TV deal imposes – or at least a slightly tighter grip on the tiller.

Host Neil Patrick Harris was in fine form on Saturday evening – hell, he even called presenter Sandra Oh a “dirty, dirty whore,” much to her delight – but despite his reference to a surplus of “no-shows” speeding up the proceedings (“Love the no-shows – tick-tock, tick-tock,” he quipped), the actual presentation dragged on a full three hours.

Of course, it would have helped if more of the Los Angeles presenters had been clued in to the fact that some of the winners not at the Century Plaza were at simultaneous ceremonies in New York (hence the ungodly 5 p.m. dinner start time), meaning they might be accepting on the other coast. The reaction shots of the crowd were almost uniformly odd and ill-chosen, so much so that presenter Jamie Lee Curtis warned everyone to try looking happier, to no avail.

From the journalists’ table way in the back (near the bathroom and bar, so thanks for that at least), you could hear voices of people loudly trying to orchestrate matters – or not. Then again, those picket lines were pretty ragged too, come to think of it.

For all that, the evening wasn’t a complete loss thanks to a few splendid moments, beginning with Carl Reiner’s acceptance speech in receiving one of the many honorary awards, in which he announced that he wasn’t sure how many more of these events he had left (he’ll turn 87 in a few months) and thus would stay on until he had garnered three big laughs. By my count there were about three times that many, highlighted by a story about Billy Wilder that would be completely lost in translation.

There was also a lot of discussion, as always, meant to buck up writers and celebrate the craft, but the standout there was William Blinn’s tough-love speech, counseling younger scribes to avoid self-pity and “Get off your ass and do the work,” adding that working writers “have an obligation to understand how goddamn lucky you are.”

Harris deserves a pat on the back under difficult circumstances. As for the rest of the evening, not to pick at what’s surely a sore point for the WGA, but the writers’ awards presentation could use a bit more direction.

Just got back from a few days in Hawaii, because A) the trip was already booked and B) somebody has to do something to try to stimulate the economy, and this is my last significant contribution for awhile before joining the rest of America and curling into a fetal position.

Anyway, here are 5 (-0 -- book 'em, Danno!) brief notes and observations regarding the trip and media in the islands:

1) To the two women who stared at me as I left that restaurant in Wailea, no, you did not see film critic/historian Leonard Maltin on your vacation in Hawaii.

2) There's a restaurant in Maui (Kihei, to be precise) called the Bada Bing, but I heard enough bad things about the food that I chickened out on going, even as a feeble excuse to try writing off part of the trip. However, if anyone has eaten there, please let me (or "The Sopranos" creator David Chase's attorneys) know.

3) Why is every local news anchor team in Honolulu an attractive young Asian woman paired with a much older white guy? Watching TV there (and admittedly, I didn't watch a lot) is sort of like revisiting Los Angeles in the 1990s, before most of the older white-guy anchors either died or were shitcanned to reduce overhead. On the plus side, I do like that some of the sports guys wear Hawaiian shirts. Now if they could just get the KTLA and KTTV morning newscasts in L.A. to wear funny hats and clown shoes.

4) The Maui News runs so many Associated Press stories that I temporarily thought I was reading the Los Angeles Times, except that the Maui paper has a better sports section.

5) Although I vowed to mostly avoid TV while away except to check weather and sports scores, I do wish somebody had reminded me that Hawaii's primetime is on the same schedule as Central time. It's annoying to get back to your hotel room at 9 p.m. with pretty much nothing to do and realizing that you've just missed "Lost."

Mahalo for your attention.

As a columnist I enjoy reading other columnists, especially those off my beat covering entertainment.

Just perusing the New York Times, I admire the way David Brooks constructs an argument (even when I disagree with them) and how cleverly Gail Collins turns a phrase. Nobody hammers a public figure quite like Frank Rich (though his targets are a trifle predictable), and on the days when she's good (which unfortunately occur with less and less frequency), no one is better than Maureen Dowd. Nicholas Kristof spurs feelings of inferiority, mostly because he has no fear of going places that appear to be dangerous hellholes.

By contrast, I'm frequently irked by those who seem to have no memory of what they've written before. That's one reason I won't miss WIlliam Kristol (whose shortcomings at the Times were well documented by Editor & Publisher's Greg Mitchell) and can't stand LA Times sports columnist Bill Plaschke.

Closer to home both geographically and in terms of subject matter, for some time now I've been annoyed by Joel Stein's column in the Los Angeles Times. But I didn't really understand the intensity of my reaction until I started writing this blog and was forced to differentiate between blog-worthy and column-worthy material.

Stein can occasionally be funny, even if the whole horny-married-guy, please-please-please-hire-me-to-write-for-a-sitcom shtick quickly wears thin. But what really bothers me about his work is that none of the ideas seem to have the weight to sustain a column. They're more like random musings str-et-ch-ed to column length.

Stein has a sort of loose theme -- our celebrity-obsessed culture -- but he goes at it in the most banal way possible. Let's goof on Ashton Kutcher for being a movie star. Let's goof on actors by auditioning for a sitcom. His latest gem is perfectly emblematic of the problem -- seeking to feebly approach the current financial crisis by filtering our economic woes through the easiest of cultural targets, a rapper named Plies, who gaudily throws cash around.

Somehow every column keeps cycling back to Stein's favorite subject -- Joel Stein, and finding employment opportunities for Joel Stein. Yet the Times' opinion editors are apparently so out of touch they view this as hip and edgy.

Granted, there are all kinds of columnists, and not all of them have to be serious and weighty. (I like to think of myself as weighty in the literal sense -- or maybe just big-boned -- but only occasionally serious.) Some will doubtless assume I'm picking a fight with another sort-of journalist to drive traffic, and while I'm probably not above that, that's honestly not the motivation. I just hate to see prime newspaper real estate (yes, I'm naive enough to assume there is still such a thing) squandered. And maybe I'm a little more sensitive because with so many former colleagues out of work, it's harder to justify the print equivalent of "Paul Blart: Mall Cop."

Besides, I have this blog now, and it needs to be fed -- even with this kind of passing thought, which does not, by any means, merit a column.

Maybe I was bored or something, but reading what really looked like a non-story in the New York Times about the possibility that ABC might move Jimmy Kimmel up a half-hour -- combined with another non-story about the alleged popularity of "hard news" the same day in the Wall Street Journal -- got me wondering if there isn't some kind of virus currently plaguing the TV beat.

The Times story cited only anonymous sources, but they might as well have asked me, since I'd have told them that it's kind of a no-brainer for ABC to maybe possible consider moving Kimmel opposite "The Tonight Show" with Conan O'Brien taking over, even though the network offered rather mealy-mouthed denials that anything official was up.

Then there was the Journal piece, which lumped the watered-down "Nightline" and MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show" in with the genuinely hard-news "60 Minutes" and "The Newshour With Jim Lehrer" to make the not-terribly-convincing case that serious news is suddenly rising from the ashes. Having sat through a "Nightline" piece days ago that was about how other media outlets were covering the Obama children -- which is about as sneaky a way as I can think of to back into covering the kids -- well, I guess reporter Rebecca Dana needed one more example to make a trend.

Let's just say that I won't be surprised if those two headlines -- "Hard News on TV Draws Major Ratings" and "ABC Said to Consider 'Kimmel' in 'Nightline' slot -- join a few other memorable ones from last year, starting with just about everything that speculated about the imminent departure of NBC Entertainment co-chair Ben Silverman.

My personal favorites remain "CBS News, Katie Couric Are Likely to Part Ways" (bylined by the aforementioned Ms. Dana in the Journal on April 10) and "Jay Leno Hints That ABC Is In His Future" (from deadlinehollywooddaily.com on July 15).

Who knows, these latest items might eventually be proven true, but for some reason I'm reminded of that old joke about the reporter for the Yeshiva Journal, who runs in to his editor's office yelling, "I've got a scoop! I've got a scoop! Hold the back page!"

While I have no desire to wade hip-deep into partisan politics, it's hard to let a bald-faced lie go by unchallenged.

Said howler can be found in radio host Rush Limbaugh's op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal about the current debate over the economic stimulus package. In the course of it, Limbaugh stated -- presumably with a straight face -- "This does not have to be a divisive issue." Hello?

For Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and an array of lower-profile commentators on the left and the right, everything has to be a divisive issue. That's their business. And thus far -- especially for the right-wing contingent with a Democrat back in the White House -- business has been quite good. Indeed, Limbaugh and Hannity have emerged as the de facto leaders of the Republican Party (actually, using the nonsensical way they cut Democratic to Democrat, I guess that could be Republic Party), filling a leadership void left in the wake of the party's congressional losses.

Limbaugh and Hannity (who has labeled his own radio show "conservatism in exile") are in fact not-so-subtly marketing themselves as a balm to those still smarting over the election, the folks who believe that Barack Obama was just short of an al-Qaeda mole. In Limbaugh-Land, every issue must thus be divisive -- part of an ongoing ideological battle (albeit one that's part one-man stage show) in which no quarter can be given.

Hey, business is business, and perhaps we should be grateful that somebody is thriving in this recession. But a call for unity and compromise? Gimme a break.

Having predicted that the switch to digital television would be delayed, I have sympathy for all sides in the debate on when to turn the lights out on analog TV -- mostly because no matter when that happens, a lot of people are going to be sitting there with a quizzical look on their face.

The whole discussion, in fact, brings to mind implementation of the V-chip, allowing parents to block objectionable programming. After months and months of blather about it, I recall polls that showed ungodly percentages of parents had never heard of it. This told me that these are the kind of parents who don't read or watch a lot of news, and that they would remain ignorant until someone knocked on their door and literally implanted a V-chip in their skulls.

Ditto for the 6.5 million households -- or about 5.7% of U.S. homes -- that profess to be unprepared for the transition, according to Nielsen. Although that figure has improved, there's no way around it: When the change finally happens, several million people are going to be sitting there with rabbit ears in one hand going, "Hey, where the hell did my TV signal go?"

As a Los Angeles resident, I am relieved to see that L.A. is only ninth on the list of least-prepared markets, behind (or actually, ahead of) Albuquerque, Dallas, Houston, Tulsa, Portland, Salt Lake City, Memphis and Austin.

Having spent a fair amount of time in Texas, I can't say the fact that three of those markets are in the Lone Star State surprises me. On the plus side, even when their TV's go dark, folks there will still have access to their beer and their guns, so it's not like they won't be able to entertain themselves.

Least Prepared Local Metered Markets Based on Percentage of Households Currently Unprepared for Digital Conversion

                                                                                source: The Nielsen Company

The scary thing about having a public forum is that once in awhile people actually listen to you. So it was with my review of NBC's two-part movie "The Last Templar," in which I cavalierly proposed that about the only way to make viewing this epic mess interestingwould be to fashion a drinking game around it -- starting with taking a swig every time someone says "Tess," the name of Mira Sorvino's plucky heroine.

Well, damned if somebody didn't take that idea and run with it. A reader named Peter Flanigan emailed me to say that he had expanded on the "Tess" suggestion with a few more of his own, among them, take a drink whenever:

- Someone delivers a "Dirty Dancing"-type line like "I'm nobody's baby."- Omar Sharif appears on screen. (Warning: This could get a bit messy in the last act of night two.)

- Tess uses karate to defend herself.

- A dead body appears on screen.

-  A character mentions an off-color remark about Tess such as "She can dig for my priceless artifacts any day."

Far be it from me to encourage excessive imbibing, but in this economic climate, why not? And it is gratifying to know that a throwaway line can lead to somebody else's raging hangover.

Despite the negative reviews, by the way (see Metacritic for a handy compilation), "Templar" wasn't a ratings disaster, averaging a respectable 9.8 million viewers based on preliminary Nielsen data. Notably, the audience appeared to skew older -- perhaps reflecting a demo more accustomed to seeing these kind of frothy two-part events on the major networks.

All they have to do now is order some projects that don't require getting hammered to sit through them.