Amid a summer of great American dogs and semi-scandalous ripoffs of ripoffs, the news that NBC is considering Rosie O'Donnell for a weekly variety show gig should provoke a little more than this dull ache in our frontal lobes. After all, this is a chance for more than just showcasing bad celebrity interviews and performances from the newest, cheapest talent from around the nation; this is an hour-per-week of Hasselbeck payback — in primetime, no less, according to EW. But there's a catch: NBC's first choice, Jay Leno, has to say no. And that's no sure thing (as elaborated after the jump):

It was less than three years ago that Boston College student Luke Russert, in an indiscretion not uncommon among underclassmen, posted to Facebook pictures of himself sitting in a hottub, surrounded by girls in bikinis. He graduated from that same school this past May and, before the end of the following month, some of the most arduous responsibilities of adulthood were already upon him. Russert was to mourn, bury, and finally eulogize his father Tim, moderator of Meet The Press, before the entire country. By most accounts, he rose impressively to the occasion, particularly with his televised memorial speech, which mixed humor, humility and a moving earnestness of purpose in a way that reminded many of his father. Now, if the Post is to be believed, Luke Russert may reach a national audience once more. Thanks to the positive public response to his eulogy, "insiders say NBC is recruiting [Russert] for its team covering the presidential election." Either that or the Post is trying to embarrass NBC by forcing it to say it does not plan to hire Russert — not implausible, given that NBC News has vehemently denied as defamatory pretty much all other gossip the tabloid has tried to extract from the funeral. Video of Russert's memorial speech is after the jump.

Following the death of NBC's Tim Russert, White House correspondent David Gregory was considered to be on the shortlist to succeed him on Meet The Press. Gregory is known for aggressively questioning White House officials and at one point so upset Bush press secretary Tony Snow that Snow accused him of partisanship, a remark for which Snow later apologized. While such assertiveness no doubt provided some cathartic release to critics of the administration, particularly those outraged at the feeble White House press corps, it may not be enough to get Gregory that Meet The Press gig or any other anchor job. In fact, the Observer today paints a rather grim picture of Gregory's immediate future, asking if he's a "lame duck" at the network, destined end up like — gasp — fellow White House troublemaker Sam Donaldson:

At NBC's TCA press conference yesterday, network co-chairs Ben Silverman and Marc Graboff confirmed their plans to eject Jay Leno from The Tonight Show via jerry-rigged catapult device on May 29, 2009. That gives them only three rushed days to erect a new set and change the dressing room door names from "Kevin Eubanks" to "Masturbating Bear" for the premiere of replacement host, Conan O'Brien. There to press the executives on the questionably motivated decision to fire the highest-rated name in late night (Graboff insisted they'd like to keep Leno at NBC Universal, but give us a break): Leno himself, disguised in a bald wig, goatee, and glasses:

We now have a better idea of how long Jimmy Fallon will be made to spin in an NBC.com hamster wheel before his big network debut: The Leno/O'Brien passing of the not-entirely-thought-out-torch will occur at the end of May 2009: "Jay Leno will sign off as host of The Tonight Show on May 29, 2009, with Conan O'Brien taking over the storied franchise on Monday, June 1, 2009." Asked for comment on this Jeff Zucker-hunch gone awry (that comes with a reported $40 million penalty fee to O'Brien should they pull out), NBC co-chair Marc Graboff told the TCA, "We made our decision and I'm happy with it. NBC will continue to dominate late-night." [TV Week]

Maybe it came out of concerns over his tepidly reviewed performance at Just For Laughs, where the straight-faced-challenged former SNL star delivered on the audience's darkest fears with groaner ditties like "You Spit When You Talk" and "Car Wash For Peace." In any case, the strange talent-shuffle scheduled at NBC late night —ratings-leader Jay Leno ejected from his Tonight Show job, Conan O'Brien shuffled in to take his place, and Jimmy Fallon ushered into the post vacated by O'Brien—has become just that much stranger. Dark Canadian comedy overlord Lorne Michaels announced Fallon would cut his teeth with a web-based mini-show leading up to his big gig:

• Most amusing bits from the lengthy Times piece this past weekend on succession at Condé Nast: That overlord Si Newhouse still "personally hand-counts ad pages in his magazines and their competitors." And that he goes to work every day in "chinos and an old sweatshirt." [NYT]

When NBC Universal jumped into bed with Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. to launch YouTube-competitor Hulu, you just knew things were going to get tawdry. Murdoch, after all, has shrewdly and repeatedly exploited the draw of sexual content, at UK newspaper The Sun (with its page three girls), on TV network Fox and elsewhere. And so perhaps it should have been clear from the get-go what Murdoch's number two Peter Chernin was wrong when he declared that Hulu was going to be "a game changer for Internet video... for the first time, consumers will get what they want." Actually, Hulu is bootstrapping itself the same way the entire rest of the internet did: via porn!

• Jeff Zucker and Harvey Weinstein faced off in a legal hearing over the rights to Project Runway. [AdWeek]

• Vogue has a fancy, new IMG-produced Web-based reality series! And it only cost $31,000 a minute to put together. [WSJ]

Remember how the New Yorker's Barack Obama cover was supposedly going to confuse a certain class of voter over whether Barack Obama is a legitimate, Democratic candidate for U.S. president or flag-burning muslim terrorist? Everyone sort of pictured these gullible souls as poor, uneducated whites, but the joke's on us, because the caricature has pushed no less a political sophisticate than MSNBC's Chris Matthews into a pit of stuttering confusion. Talking about the cover on Hardball tonight, Matthews suffered a severe relapse of his notorious Obama/Osama condition. Symptoms include calling Obama by the name of terrorist Osama bin Laden; referring to bin Laden as "Obama" and flashing on-screen pictures of one dude when talking about the other. Click the thumb to see which one happened tonight. HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY NEW YORKER FASCISTS. [Huffington Post]

With a little help from brands McDonald’s, Johnson & Johnson, Hilton, Coca-Cola and Anheuser-Busch, NBC Universal is 85 percent sold out of its expected inventory of ads to play at the beginning ofOlympics Web videos. All of the ads will be 15- and 30-second "prerolls" — because that's the only kind the International Olympic Committee currently allows. Hate prerolls? Go ahead and set up your own broadcast, then, bub. (Photo by striatic)

As of today, our fantasy of an exotic lifestyle of TV criticism is officially over — beaten, bloodied and left for dead by Ray Richmond, who compares the debauched good old days of the Television Critics Association press tours to the nearly irrelevant confab starting tomorrow in Beverly Hills. It's the first such event since July 2007, back before last winter's conference was scuttled by the writers strike and mainstream media had begun shearing critics and culture writers from their ranks like slabs of fat.

Did you read our post that said a contractor at NBC had been fired for updating Tim Russert's Wikipedia page with news of the Meet the Press moderator's death? Um, never mind: Silicon Alley Insider reporter Michael Learmonth has confirmed with NBC executives that "the dude," as he puts it, wasn't fired, although he was briefly suspended. Since the earlier New York Times report was credibly reported from NBC employees, I emailed Learmonth to double-check his sources. Turns out he'd had the correct story all along, but we all liked "fired" better.

After the election, Tom Brokaw will end his stint as host of Meet the Press (which is too bad, because as smug as the dude is, he's been good). Then no one—least of all NBC—knows what will happen. Howard Kurtz seems to think Ted Koppel might get the job, and Koppel has not ruled that out. But he is old, and he retired from regular TV news to do 50-part documentaries on China. If NBC plans on poaching someone so expensive from ABC, they should go after Diane Sawyer, who is bored with Good Morning America and pissed off at the network for sending Charlie Gibson to the evening news and keeping her in the morning ghetto. DC's elite will be able to get over their horror as the prospect of a lady in the Meet the Press chair by reminding themselves that she's a Republican hack who once dated Kissinger. And so the Sunday Morning Circle Jerk will continue.

NBC Universal and two private equity firms, Bain Capital and the Blackstone Group, acquired the Weather Channel and Weather.com from Landmark Communications over the weekend for a rumored $3.5 billion. Yes, we're not shocked either that NBC figured out Weather Plus wasn't taking over the meteorological universe. [PaidContent]

• The Weather Channel was sold by Landmark Communications to NBC Universal, Bain Capital, and Blackstone for just under $3.5 billion. [NYT]

Because global weather patterns will only get more catastrophic until the last human finally starves in a sea of sand and fire, NBC Universal is wisely buying the Weather Channel for $3.5 billion. The deal includes website Weather.com, but more exciting for NBC is surely the cable channel, carried in 97 percent of U.S. homes. Imagine the cross-promotional possibilities that will emerge as global warming engulfs both coasts, and their advertiser-coveted demographics, in slow but steady ruin!

What took Hollywood so long? Tim Russert died on June 13th and they're only just now announcing plans to make a movie about his life? On July 2nd? Come on, people, that's 19 days. Used to be a movie like that would get announced under a week after the tragedy. Summer must be making everyone lazy.

Everyone is complaining that Sunday's Tom Brokaw-hosted Meet the Press was too boring. ("A little too much comity!" -Alessandra Stanley. "The Most Boring Meet the Press Ever!" -Jossip.) Is that bad? We didn't watch it, but we're still going to say "no." Look, Tim Russert, may he rest in peace, was a fantastic broadcaster, and yes, he made the show entertaining as hell, but if Tom Brokaw is ditching Tim's trademark "once you said this, now you say this, EXPLAIN YOURSELF" method, more power to him and to NBC. We realize it's not what the Sunday shows are "about," but let's not bitch about how "boring" a quiet, informed political debate is while we're all hand-wringing about how toxic and broken the campaign process has become. Deal? After the jump, a clip of Brokaw interviewing NBC analyst Chuck Todd. Tom's gentle admonishment of Chuck was apparently the most interesting part of the broadcast.