• NBC chief Jeff Zucker says that despite the fact Jim Cramer got his ass handed to him last week by Jon Stewart, it's had absolutely no impact on CNBC. Believe that and you may also be willing to buy that everything's perfect at MSNBC and NBC, and Zucker has a perfect head of hair, too. [Portfolio, B&C]
• Crain Communications has cut 150 staffers and sliced salaries by 10%. [PC]
• Don Hewitt, the creator of 60 Minutes, is in the hospital with cancer. [Wow]
• Media advertising fell 2.6% in 2008, according to Nielsen. [B&C]
• Interview seems to be having financial difficulties. [Gawker]
• Discovery has filed a patent suit against Amazon over the Kindle. [WSJ]
• The Hills's Audrina Patridge has a reality show of her own in the works. [THR]
• CNN's Lou Dobbs is a racist. But you probably knew that already. [Gawker]

NBC capo Jeff Zucker, today: "CNBC is a spectacular organization and in particular Jim Cramer."

• Jon Stewart's smackdown of Jim Cramer last week generated some of the biggest ratings The Daily Show has ever seen, not surprisingly. [MediaPost]
• Portfolio editor Joanne Lipman has once again defied logic (and some of her Condé colleagues) by putting Sarah Palin on the cover of the new issue. [WWD]
• Condé Nast is expected to trim Richard Beckman's ad sales group. [AdAge]
• Liberal activists have launched a petition drive targeted at CNBC. [AP]
• ICM's Esther Newberg has sold a memoir by Paul Allen to Penguin. [Crains]
• More on Eric Siminoff's split from Lynn Nesbit and Mort Janklow. [NYO]
• Mel Karmazin sounds off on his fight to redeem Sirius and his rep. [Fortune]
• Ratings for Donald Trump's Celebrity Apprentice continue to slide. [AdAge]
• 60 Minutes is the "hottest show on TV." Who knew? [Newsweek]

Confused, misdirected populist rage threatens Obama from all sides! And there's really nothing he can do! Well, there's one thing he could do.

Ron Insana left CNBC three years ago to run a hedge fund. Like Lou Dobbs and Steven Rattner before him, he learned that actually succeeding in business is not as easy as covering success in business. So now he's begged a part-time reporting job from his old bosses. At least he'll be able to share his Wall-Street-insider wisdom with viewers. Just like Jim Cramer!

CNBC didn't do the honorable thing and shut down today. So, Jim Cramer still has his psychotic money clown show which he opened tonight with the sort of humor that makes him a broadcast treasure.

Denial appears to be the official position on Jim Cramer following his pantsing by Jon Stewart. CNBCers don't believe there's a problem, while MSNBC is doing their best to pretendCramer doesn't exist.

Jim Cramer is a buffoon and dispenses terrible advice; by all accounts, he was a mediocre hedge fund manager before he even became a media celebrity. But he has a long track record for legally questionable behavior, too, as numerous people have pointed out over the years. Gawker has a good roundup of the charges that have been lobbed Cramer's way over the years. [Gawker]

Jim Cramer knows how easy CNBC is to fool. He used to play the network himself. Here are five episodes from the stock speculator's past that could use some dusting off.

• Jon Stewart's showdown with Jim Cramer is getting mixed reviews, mainly because both deviated from their typical personas: the normally brash Cramer was a wimp and Stewart wasn't funny. It "felt like a Senate subcommittee hearing," writes Alessandra Stanley. [NYT, Salon, Atlantic, ABC]
• TMZ and Extra have extended their coverage to the financial services industry! Isn't it ironic that TMZ has exposed more corporate misbehavior over the past few months than CNBC has? Because it sort of has. [NYT]
• Google sales chief Tim Armstrong is the new chairman and CEO of AOL. [WSJ]
• Jim Kelly is stepping down as managing editor of Time Inc. [NYP]
• Fox has dumped Peter Liguori in favor of Fox Searchlight's Peter Rice. [THR]
• More changes are ahead at the Peter Brant-owned Interview. [WWD]
• Mel Karmazin says Sirius's poor performance last quarter was due to "doom and gloom" rumors suggesting the company would go bankrupt. [WSJ]
• Jimmy Fallon finished his first week with solid ratings, beating out the numbers that Conan O'Brien typically generated. Depressing, huh? [Variety]

The only thing that stopped last night's Jim Cramer-Jon Stewart battle from becoming a total bloodbath was that it was such a rout, with CNBC's Cramer in steady retreat.

CNBC, Fox Business and Bloomberg didn't warn investors about financial armageddon, and they're not providing much catharsis now. Which is why it's fantastic that the likes of TMZ and Extra now chase financial stories.

What happened to Jim Cramer? CNBC's Mad Money host screams stock-market tips with alpha male abandon, but he looked like he was going to wet himself in his Daily Show grudge match tonight.



Having been slammed repeatedly by host Jon Stewart over the past few days for one-sided journalism, Cramer fled any real direct confrontation in his lengthy interview and instead went contrite — absurdly contrite. His voice went high and cracked, his thoughts fragmented as they left his mouth.

It sounds like Jon Stewart will be giving Daily Show guest Jim Cramer the Tucker Carlson treatment: The Daily Show's Thursday taping ran way over schedule as Stewart "repeatedly chastised" Cramer, AP reports.

Will tonight's Daily Show appearance cement Jim Cramer's reputation as the Bernie Madoff of the Media? The embattled business analyst turned up on recovered felon Martha Stewart's show this morning to lower expectations.

• Jim Cramer hits The Daily Show tonight. And in what can only be interpreted as an effort to dial down the ass-kicking headed his way, Cramer is now claiming Jon Stewart is "his idol." Good luck with that there, Jim. [HP]
• Should CNBC's Erin Burnett really be making appearances on Donald Trump's Celebrity Apprentice? Maybe not: "NBC keeps testing the limits between news and entertainment in pursuit of cross-promotional synergy." [NYT]
• "Sully" Sullenberger has scored a two-book deal worth $3 million. [TDB]
• Ann Coulter "has been especially noisy in her self-promotion lately," which may have something to do with the fact her book isn't selling. [Portfolio]
• More and more TV shows are working the recession into storylines. [ABC]
• These are dark days for the newspaper biz, as you've probably heard. [NYT]
• More on Ross Douthat, the conservative blogger who has been hired by The New York Times to take over Bill Kristol's Op-Ed column. [E&P]
• Post staffers reflect on the life and times of Braden Keil, the paper's real estate columnist who died on Tuesday and who will be very much missed. [NYO]

CNBC's Jim Cramer was spotted at a Brooklyn bistro the night before his much-anticipated chat with nemesis Jon Stewart on the Daily Show. The stalker sighting, complete with an "adoring fan:"

CNBC's Jim Cramer is scheduled to appear on Stewart's show tomorrow night in culmination of a week-long basic-cable feud, and the sitdown was CNBC's idea, Gawker has learned.

You have to hand it to Jon Stewart: The Daily Show host at least has the good sense to mock his "Basic Cable Personality Clash" with Jim Cramer the very moment it becomes mockable.

Well, someone at CNBC finally had the nerve and basic PR savvy to answer Jon Stewart: Jim Cramer, the Daily Show host's recent favorite whipping boy, will appear on the fake news show Thursday.