• In case you didn’t see our comment on Rachel Maddow’s war of words with PolitiFact, we’d like to point it out again for your kids. We think that there is a lot of context worthy of your time. Above is Maddow’s clip from last night, which, while accurate in pointing out that PolitiFact isn’t always right, does the same kind of cherry-picking that PolitiFact did. From the report, they only quoted a two-second part of a clip that has much more direct context at play. Tommy Christopher at Mediaite took a swing at this whole issue, too, and you know what? He noticed the same thing we did about her surplus/deficit quote. “That passage can be read both ways, but in at least the semantic sense, Politifact is wrong. Their reading of this passage is a matter of interpretation.” In other words, while the exact quote Rachel Maddow pulled proves PolitiFact’s headline is in fact “False,” the problem is that the larger context, which claims that Walker turned a surplus into a deficit (the point of the article), is closer to the truth than Maddow’s people will like. Sorry, Rachel. source

• The week in Olbermann Keith Olbermann has had a pretty busy week. It started with him ripping Jon Stewart while kneeling to him simultaneously. It ended with him getting suspended and getting Bill Kristol of all people defending him. This is prime territory of two media sources: Howard Kurtz and Mediaite. Both are covered here.
• Countdown’s quick word “We know you are all looking forward to Keith’s return, and so are we.” We can imagine how weird it must be for Olbermann and the network that Olbermann revitalized to be going through with this. MSNBC sounds like Courtney Cox trying to be diplomatic about her separation from David Arquette.
• So, to be clear … Eric Cantor, the likely new House Majority Leader, showed up on “Fox News Sunday” today, and was thrown a question on whether he’d allow a government shutdown on Obama’s watch, like in 1995. Notice how he didn’t say no, and suggested it would be Obama’s fault if it happened.

• They’ll think somehow that that will resonate with voters, that 20 years ago Christine O’Donnell on MTV said ‘Masturbation is a sin.’ And they’ll play it, and they’ll ridicule it, and the voters will be like, ‘Yeah, I don’t have a job.’ That’s how they’ll blow it.
• Jon “I’ve been in the news a lot lately” Stewart • Making a key point about another person who’s been in the news a lot lately, Delaware Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell, during a NPR interview. We can’t find any fault in his warning to Democrats, really. In other Stewart news, the dude apparently got an apology from Rick Sanchez today. In other Christine O’Donnell news, she released her first full campaign ad today, and it’s very apologetic about her various weird statements in the ’90s. In other other Christine O’Donnell news, Bill Maher is really pissed that she hasn’t gone on his show. “It hurt me. It hurt me very deeply,” Maher said. “I don’t like it when people forget who they’re friends are, you know, who they started out with.” Oh, and there’s also this. Wait, that’s only from 2006! And it has nothing to do with the culture wars! source

• Mediaite totally played up this Fox News clip as a “great television moment,” but before the two minute point or so, we were a bit skeptical. The issue? 9/11 first responder health care benefits – a bill which didn’t pass the House despite it being, you know, 9/11 first responder health care benefits. In the clip, Peter King first gets his point across, Anthony Wiener just stands there, livid. The second Wiener starts talking, it immediately lives up to the hype. For fans of wonkery, this is your “Citizen Kane.” (Side note: Thanks to Mediaite for improving your embeds!) source

• KeithOlbermann.com, named for MSNBC’s most-well-known personality, was just bought by the folks at The Daily Caller, a site run by former MSNBC guy Tucker Carlson. It plans to write commentary specifically about Keith Olbermann. To top it all off, we found out about this story on Mediaite, a site owned by former MSNBC personality (and current NBC News personality) Dan Abrams. It’s like inside baseball on inside baseball – which is even more ironic because Keith Olbermann’s a huge baseball fan. source

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• “Strong earthquake in the Los Angeles area”: Talk about a phrase we could go without hearing. While the quake was powerful, it definitely wasn’t an end-of-the-world situation by any stretch. Mediaite has the initial reports from CNN, which they totally got the jump on over MSNBC and Fox News, including the use of Twitter. source