Bill O'Reilly and Chris Matthews are both famous cable news shouty persons, yes, but beyond that how much do they have in common? Both cling to a Northeastern Working-Class Catholicism that colors their broadcast personae even though they've both been rich and famous long enough to leave most of the lessons behind besides the strict moralism. But Matthews is an old Democrat working for liberal-leaning MSNBC, and O'Reilly is a culture war conservative with GOP in-house propaganda machine Fox. One more thing they share: they're not particularly liked by their peers! Matthews is seen as an overenthusiastic, affection-starved dog, at least if last April's devastating Times Magazine profile is to be believed. O'Reilly is just seen as a dick, if Michael Wolff is to be believed.

Wolff wrote a biography of Fox owner and tyrant Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch has cozied up a bit to Barack Obama and has been focusing, lately, on turning the Wall Street Journal into a serious competitor of the New York Times. So Fox's cartoonish liberal-bashing is a bit embarrassing to him, according to the book.

“It is not just Murdoch (and everybody else at News Corp.’s highest levels) who absolutely despises Bill O’Reilly, the bullying, mean-spirited, and hugely successful evening commentator,” Wolff wrote, “but [Fox News chief executive] Roger Ailes himself who loathes him. Success, however, has cemented everyone to each other."

“The embarrassment can no longer be missed,” Wolff wrote, in another section of the book. “He mumbles even more than usual when called on to justify it. He barely pretends to hide the way he feels about Bill O’Reilly. And while it is not that he would give Fox up—because the money is the money; success trumps all—in the larger sense of who he is, he seems to want to hedge his bets.”

It's all because Murdoch's wife and children are limousine liberals now, and in this new Obama era, we are all out-of-touch cultural elites, aren't we? But O'Reilly, and Fox, still make money, so Murdoch will not be changing anything about them until they stop making money. He is a capitalist, not an ideologue.

Oh, but what was that about Chris Matthews? He is going to run for the Senate! Against maybe Arlen Specter, the ancient Republican?

FiveThirtyEight has been hearing for some time that Matthews is serious about running for the United States Senate, but it took a trip to Georgia among the Georgia-runoff-congregated and well-connected Obama organizer throng to confirm.

According to multiple sources, who confirmed the Tip O'Neill staffer-cum-MSNBC host has negotiated with veteran Obama staffers to enlist in his campaign, Chris Matthews is likely to run for United States Senate in Pennsylvania in 2010. Matthews, 62, would run as a Democrat. Arlen Specter, the aging Republican incumbent, will be 80 if he chooses to run for re-election.

It is Chris' life-long dream to be a Senator, and that is a sad dream, but still. If Specter retires, and his health suggests he might, the Democrats would be fools to hand an easy Democratic seat pickup to a liberal broadcaster with a long history of ignorant sexist comments, but, you know, they're the Democratic Party. They nominated Al Franken to run in Minnesota, didn't they?