They grow up so fast, don’t they? Online political media giant Politico turns five years old today, and to celebrate, the site posted a video roast by some quotable notables in the political media world. While the site has arguably earned the right to toot its own horn at least once every half-decade, did they really have to overshadow the birthday of Saved By The Bell actress Tiffani-Amber Thiessen?

While two years of Republican health care “Lies of the Year” had mostly alienated Politifact from conservative good favor, now those who were happy to cheer on the acknowledgement of “Death Panels” as ridiculous and the “pants on fire” status of people like Glenn Beck and Speaker John Boehner are outraged at what some are calling reputation-ending factual errors in the site’s newly-unveiled award. Yes, Politifact has turned on the Democrats and it has produced a somewhat ugly response. But blasting Politifact for lying about Democratic honesty misses a crucial point: even if the Democrats were lying about Medicare, there were many more interesting and significant lies told in 2010.

At noon eastern time today, the Alex Wagner era at MSNBC began with the debut of the former Politics Daily White House correspondent’s newshour, NOW. Joined by a whip-smart panel that included HDNet‘s Dan Rather, Politico‘s Maggie Haberman, and New York Magazine‘s John Heilemann, Wagner kicked off the show with an examination of how President Obama‘s handling of the debt supercommittee is playing with voters.

As part of our one-part series Project: In Vino, Mediaite set out to capture media elites, gathered to fête Hardball host Chris Matthews‘ Jack Kennedy: Elusive Hero, in their alcohol-lubricated natural habitat, and maybe to drink some of it ourselves. With the aid of a hidden camera, I ventured to MSNBC’s book party Tuesday night to tear the lid off of this den of open bars and Wagyu beef hors d’oeuvres.

Dan Rather made a rather surprising statement on The Chris Matthews Show today when he said that one of the driving forces behind the Occupy Wall Street protests “is a woman operating out of her apartment in New York.” Rather argued earlier on the show that the Occupy Wall Street protests were a “mirror image” of the Tea Party protests, or at least have the potential to be.

With bad economic news surrounding President Obama, Chris Matthews warns that if unemployment stays above 9% Obama will not be able to get re-elected. Dan Rather joined Matthews’ Sunday show panel, agreed that unemployment is the biggest concern for Obama and gave the President advice that should be listened to right away.

When suburban Philadelphia resident Patrick Rodgers discovered that his bank had charged him for mortgage payments not agreed upon, he turned the tables, and “foreclosed on the foreclosers.” Since it’s the perfect cable news interest story, this story received a decent amount of national attention, though as Stephen Colbert pointed out last night, cable news hosts — in particular, Don Lemon — missed the story: Rodgers is a vampire!

Chris Matthews assembled a panel including Dan Rather and Rachel Maddow to discuss whether Republican Congresswoman Michele Bachmann should enter the presidential race to scoop up Mike Huckabee‘s voters in Iowa. Surprisingly, Rather spoke very highly of Bachmann and called her “very articulate” and someone who could be “dynamite” in the race.

As speculation continues that Donald Trump may be planning to run for President, there’s no doubt that his brash, willing to say anything attitude is shaking up the political world. However, on his path towards success, Trump made plenty of enemies and now might be the time that some of them are waiting for, in order to extract maximum revenge.

Former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather says President Obama’s caught in a “political nightmare” over the likely extension of the Bush tax cuts for another two years.

Rather, speaking on MSNBC’s Jansing & Company said an extension of those cuts will infuriate the left and lead to a Democratic primary challenge against the president in 2012:

Onetime top TV news titan Dan Rather has something to say about his career, from the Kennedy assassination to his unceremonious exit from CBS. Keith Kelly writes in the New York Post the newsman’s memoir will:

On Monday, the New York Times ran a “Frequent Flier” column penned by Michael Clemente, Fox News’s senior vice president for news. In the piece, Clemente reflects on his above-ground experiences—and recalls one particularly memorable plane ride with Peter Jennings, Tom Brokaw and Dan Rather.

Longtime CBS News correspondent Harold Dow died suddenly yesterday, he was 62. Dow had been a contributor to CBS’s news magazine show 48 Hours since it began in 1988 and a correspondent since 1990. He was a five-time Emmy Award-winner and also the recipient of a RTNDA Edward R. Murrow Award, an Operation Push Excellence in Journalism Award, and a George Foster Peabody Award.

Former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather and future MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell are in the anchor chair during what appears to be an alien invasion…

…In the upcoming movie Skyline, out November 11. Here’s the trailer.

This week marks the one year anniversary of the launch of Mediaite, and what a year it has been. As Dan Abrams notes, predictions of Mediaite’s doom were greatly exaggerated, and as Mediaite columnist and White House reporter from Day One, I have viewed the site’s successful first year from a unique perch. When Rachel Sklar pitched the site to me, I have to confess I was a little bit skeptical, but it didn’t take long for me to see that she and Dan were on to something.

Before you jump to panicked conclusions, Matthews is not comparing Sarah Palin to President Nixon. He is comparing her to former Vice President, defeated presidential candidate Richard Nixon who spent the intervening years between losing to John F. Kennedy in 1960 and his 1968 campaign relentlessly touring the world, denying his presidential ambitions, all the while quietly (and ingeniously) setting the stage for a presidential run.

Dan Rather is responding today to the questionably-worded anecdote (“he couldn’t sell watermelons if it, you gave him the state troopers to flag down the traffic”) – and he’s doing so in a decidedly un-140-character way.

In a lengthy blog post on The Huffington Post, Rather explains why it’s, at least in part, our collective fault.

Dan Rather, longtime anchor at the CBS Evening News and now of HD Net, has been known for his analogies and anecdotes (Ratherisms).

But Newsbusters has caught one that seems to have gone way off the rails during an appearance on the Chris Matthews Show Sunday – involving Pres. Obama and “watermelons.”

Anyone who works in media these days — especially online — knows that it can be an all-consuming lifestyle, caught up in the immediacy of the 24-7 news cycle and very much given to being swept up by the wildly fluctuating highs and lows of the moment. That’s why it’s so nice to step back [...]

Don Imus kicks off his Fox Business Network morning show on Monday (we’ll have more on that coming soon), but today he’s interviewed by FNC/FBN anchor Neil Cavuto. The interview airs at 4pmET on Fox News and 6pmET on FBN – and there are quite a few soundbites sure to garner some attention.

We got a look at some excerpts – including shots at Dan Rather, David Letterman and even his new colleague Glenn Beck.

The New York Supreme Court appellate division dismissed Dan Rather‘s $70 million lawsuit against his former employer CBS yesterday, and both sides have weighed in. But one person who hasn’t talked yet is Rather himself.

He’ll make his first comments since the dismissal tomorrow – on Fox News.

The New York Supreme Court appellate division has dismissed in full the $70 million lawsuit filed by Dan Rather against his former employer, CBS News, today.

Rather’s team called the decision “incorrect on a number of grounds,” while a CBS News statement says “this lawsuit is now effectively over.” Here’s some of the lengthy ruling, and some background:

In yet another Future of the News discussion, it would be far too easy to retread the same tired information. But with leaders in three separate media branches — including Dan Rather and the New Yorker‘s Jane Mayer — at his disposal, moderator Victor Navasky didn’t limit the agenda for the evening. Instead, he kept it open-ended and tried to address the question of the evening: What’s in store for the future of media?

Remember when an anchor stepping down was a huge deal? Tom Brokaw. Dan Rather. Peter Jennings. These names were huge pillars of the news ecosystem, and their departures were big stories — as well as the fraught issue of who had the gravitas to step into their anchorly shoes.

Oh, how things have changed. Today, the news that Charlie Gibson is leaving ABC’s World News after only a few years in the top spot is definitely news, but is shaking no foundations. It’s also not at all surprising who is replacing him: Diane Sawyer. Well, except that she’s a woman.

A column in the Washington Post this Sunday is the latest in Dan Rather‘s campaign to get President Obama to convene “White House commission on public media” — an important step towards legitimizing the debate about the future of the news. But do we really need more government in our news?