Its new shows are in the toilet and it conceded a huge chunk of its prime time lineup to Jay Leno's horrid chatfest. How does the network rebound? By purchasing a new game show! The future holds nothing but death.

• It's all over for Dan Rather and his long-running legal campaign against CBS. A state appeals court dismissed the ex-anchor's lawsuit today. [Reuters, NYP]
• At least four parties are still in the bidding for BusinessWeek. But Bloomberg LP remains the most likely acquirer of the struggling magazine. [BW, Reuters]
• An "unbelievably conscientious" Sarah Palin has finishing her memoir in less than four months. You can not buy the book beginning on November 17. [WP]
• Michelle Obama will appear as guest on Sesame Street's season debut. [NYT]
• TLC announced today it's dropping Jon Gosselin from Jon & Kate Plus 8. This news calls out for name change, obvs, so it'll be Kate Plus 8 from now on. [THR]

Funnyman Jay Leno "cracked" (call me, Jay) some "jokes" last night about Conan O'Brien's head injury. Maybe Conan knocked himself out just so he wouldn't have to watch Jay Leno, on NBC television! That's as funny as the actual jokes.

We've gotten most of the new series premieres out of the way, and a funny thing happened—most of them are doing pretty well. What does all this mean?

Look, Rush Limbaugh ran over a carboard cutout of Al Gore, in an electric car, and then he backed up and did it again! COMEDY! AT TEN O'CLOCK! HAVE YOU EVER IN YOUR LIFE SEEN SUCH A THING??

And neither has his audience! Last night he featured two tired bits from '90s punchline Pee Wee Herman. What's next, dancing Itos? Even the new talent he's found is spectacularly unfunny. Oh, and he just discovered gentrification in Harlem!

• Rumor has it Condé Nast isn't going to shutter several of its money-losing magazines like Details and Teen Vogue, after all. But the budget review that's taken place in recent weeks seems to have "scared fiscal responsibility into some of the highest-rolling titles at the glitzy empire." This means Graydon Carter won't be making it to London or Milan Fashion Week, sadly. [NYP]
• Irving Kristol, the godfather of neo-conservatism, is dead at 89. [AP]
• Oprah has picked the next big best-seller. The latest pick for her book club is a set of short stories by Uwem Akpa called Say You're One of Them. [NYDN]
• After a 72-year run, Guiding Light's final episode aired today. [Reuters]
• CNBC has canceled Dennis Kneale's 8pm show on the network. [NYO]
• The Emmy Awards take place this Sunday. Who's going to win? If you watched last year's telecast, you may already have the answers. [WP]

• Glenn Beck is Time magazine's cover boy this week, sadly. [Time, HuffPo]
• Spike Lee and Robert De Niro are teaming up with Showtime "to develop a drama series about Manhattan's Alphabet City." [THR]
• Twitter is now worth $1 billion, believe it or not. [TechCrunch]
• Nikki Finke hears that Variety is planning to start charging for access to its website and The Hollywood Reporter is dropping its daily print edition. [DHD]
• Jenna Bush made her debut on the Today show this morning. [BS]
• An update how Jay Leno's new show is faring three days in. [NYT]
• An update on the protracted legal battle between CBS and ex-anchor Dan Rather, a feud that only "seems to get pettier by the day." [TDB]
• Fox 5's Ernie Anastos managed to both embarrass himself and coin a delightful new catchphrase on the news last night. [Gawker, NYP, B&C]

• As expected, ratings for Jay Leno's new show are falling fast. [THR]
• Bloomberg LP appears to now be in the lead to buy BusinessWeek. [NYP]
• Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol sold 1 million copies its first day. [NYT]
• Don't try to talk to Vogue publisher Tom Florio about what changes are in store for the mag now that those McKinsey consultants have finished their review. (He's not talking about it.) Meantime, McKinsey's final report will be handed over to Condé Nast's management next week. [NYO, WWD]
• Fox News boss Roger Ailes collected $24 million in compensation last year, which is $2 million more than his boss, Rupert Murdoch, took home. [BW]
• Jay-Z has his 11th No. 1 album. That puts him ahead of Elvis Presley as the solo artist with the most chart-toppers. But he's still behind the Beatles. [LAT]

After a bang-up opener which drew 18 million viewers, what's a third of your audience more or less?

It's 90's-a-go-go all over entertainment. Harvey Weinstein's pacing a festival screening lobby , Rupert Murdoch's got it all figured out, and Jay Leno is still the King just like the olden times. It's all in the trades.

Barack Obama will be on The Late Show with David Letterman next Monday. (This after he hits every single Sunday morning show—he will be exhausted!) This is obviously a snub of terrible Jay Leno.

• So how did Jay Leno's new show do? He hit it out of the park ratings-wise, roping in an estimated 18 million viewers. The reviews were all pretty lousy, though, so don't be surprised if it's all downhill from here. [AdAge, LAT, THR]
• The sale of BusinessWeek: Bruce Wasserstein has dropped out as a potential acquirer of the struggling mag. And it's cutting 20% of its staff. [BW, NYT]
• ABC News has apologized to the White House for Nightline anchor Terry Moran's tweet about Obama calling Kanye West a "jackass." [LAT]
• Speaking of the White House, Barack Obama will be David Letterman's guest on Monday night; it's the first time a sitting president has done the show. [NYT]
• Oprah's season premiere scored big thanks to Whitney Houston. [Wrap]
• The House of Harvey has sustained another blow: Harvey Weinstein's 70 percent stake in the home-video distributor Genius Products, once worth as much as $400 million, is now pretty much worthless. [NYP]
• Speaking of the film mogul, The Weinstein Co. picked up the rights to A Single Man, designer Tom Ford's debut film, at the Toronto Film Festival. [THR]

• July 1, 2011. This will be the date when the world sees Peter Berg's Battleship film, inspired by the Hasbro plastic peg board game. [Variety]

Kanye West wasn't the only person who squirmed thanks to the primetime premiere of The Jay Leno Show. 17.7 million people tuned in for the unfunniest hour since on network TV since Bush's last State of the Union.

We tuned into Leno's first hour hoping that the comedian might be able to pull out a stellar performance. Instead, what we got was a slap-dash version of The Tonight Show, but with even less funny jokes.

Everyone is paying attention to NBC's bold prime time experiment, which kicks off tonight. Many are waiting for Leno to fail so let's throw some digital spitballs at him.

How did Jay Leno become the most punk rock upstart revolutionary force in media today? Across the spectrum, the entertainment world has lined-up arm-in-arm, salivating at the prospect of disaster when his new show debuts tonight.

It's on in Toronto. Despite pre-festival buzz about the death of independent film and grown-up distribution, turns out there's still enough hype to light up on Canadian city.

• Today's awkward cable moments: CNN reported this morning that the Coast Guard opened fire on a boat on the Potomoc. (Not true.) And the geniuses at MSNBC thought it would be a really neat idea to once again commemorate 9/11 by re-airing its coverage from the fateful morning. Thanks, guys.
• Fran Drescher is in discussions to host a Fox News show. No joke. [USN]
• President Obama sits down with Steve Kroft on Sunday's 60 Minutes. [CBS]
• A long list of media figures turned out for Dominick Dunne's memorial service yesterday at Church of Saint Vincent Ferrer on the UES. [NYT, WWD]
• Anna Wintour is "bigger than ever," at least according to Tina Brown. [TDB]
• Obits: Larry Gelbart, the man who developed the TV series MASH and co-wrote Tootsie, is dead at 81. And Frank Batten Sr., the man responsible for bringing the Weather Channel into the world, is dead at 82.
• As if Twitter wasn't inundated with enough self-promotion as it is, the company now says it plans to start accepting advertising. [Reuters]