Mediaite’s Tommy Christopher — the lefty you love to hate…or just love — has been busy the last few days, fighting off horrifying allegations that might fell a lesser man. In one of the most ridiculous and occasionally amusing uses of internet bytes:

It turns out that Texas Gov. Rick Perry doesn’t just have trouble remembering lists of three. In an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer Wednesday afternoon, the forgetful former frontrunner had trouble remembering just one conservative website, the Michelle Malkin-founded, Ed Morrissey-run Hot Air. Discussing a possible path to victory in Iowa, Perry told Blitzer he had seen a poll “off the internet. I think ‘Hot Gas’ was the site.”

Current national Republican frontrunner Newt Gingrich released his first TV ad today, entitled “Is the America We Love a Thing of the Past?”

The spot is being supported by a near Tiffany-esque $250,000 ad buy in Iowa, where Gingrich leads steadily rising Ron Paul by 7 points, and is drawing comparisons to Ronald Reagan’s famous “Morning In America” commercial. However, a glaring difference between the two ads seems to make clear what the America Newt doesn’t love looks like.

Conservative blogs like American Thinker and Instahpundit are up in arms over PBS’ alleged “alteration” of the transcript to President Obama‘s jobs speech before a joint session of Congress Thursday night. They allege that the PBS website “altered” the transcript to cover up for a gaffe that the President committed during the speech, referring to Abraham Lincoln as the “founder” of the Republican Party, rather than as the “Father of the Republican Party.”

Pat Dollard, a contributing journalist to Andrew Breitbart‘s “Big” websites, reported via his Twitter feed that the University of Arizona had told him that the White House was involved in creating t-shirts with the slogan “Together We Thrive” for the Tucson Memorial in January. Both the White House and the U of A denied this in January, but in light of this fresh allegation, I decided to check with White House Press Secretary Jay Carney at Tuesday’s briefing.

Sarah Palin‘s “One Nation” bus tour appeared to have gotten off to a false start yesterday as a member of the pro-veterans organization Rolling Thunder went on NBC to denounce her presence at an upcoming event of theirs, claiming no one had invited her. Turns out, as per organization spokesperson Christine Colborne, Palin had been invited, but had RSVP’d too soon for the group to announce her arrival to all its members.

Reaction to President Obama‘s Wednesday remarks on the situation in Libya was roundly negative, characterized by Chris Matthews and panel’s suggestion that the statement was “weak.”

Earlier, I reported on right-wing blogger Jim Hoft‘s attack on Michelle Obama‘s dress, and the hypocritical conservative media culture that enables him. On the other side of the ledger, there’s the exceedingly decent Ed Morrissey, who today defends the First Lady against the Drudge-promoted charge that she’s responsible for an uptick in pedestrian fatalities, and calls out The Daily Caller for implying that the Obama daughters are somehow to blame for a de-icing disparity between their private school and the public school across the street.

The most recent of several smears centered on the t-shirts that were distributed at the Tucson memorial alleges that the slogan “Rocking America and Rocking the Vote” was printed at the bottom of the shirts.

Andrew Breitbart’s Big Journalism has promoted the completely unsourced claim, but Mediaite has confirmed that it is, indeed, made-up nonsense.

Among attempts by some conservatives to cast last night’s “Together We Thrive” memorial for victims of the massacre in Tucson in a negative light were suggestions that the White House was involved in designing and distributing t-shirts at the event. While that notion has already been partially debunked, we looked into the rumors, and besides a frank denial from the White House, we’ve uncovered some relevant details about the shirts, which were, infact, distributed by the University of Arizona.

The parade of TSA horror stories continued this weekend, as a YouTube video featuring a young boy being patted down has gone viral, hitting the top spot on mega-aggregator The Drudge Report. In the cellphone clip, posted by college student Luke Tait, a shirtless young boy is being patted down by TSA agents, prompting Drudge to dub the video “Hands on Boy.”

The TSA has responded to the clip on their blog, and offered some facts that differed from the account posted on Tait’s YouTube account. After the jump, check out the video, and decide if TSA’s explanation really helps at all.

John Tyner, the man whose viral video refusal to have his “junk touched” has made him something of a folk hero, appeared on Fox News‘ America Live to respond to unfortunately-named TSA administrator John Pistole, among other things. While Pistole and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano maintain that the privacy of Tyner’s privates is a small sacrifice to make, software engineer Tyner says his hardware is off-limits.

In an editorial for USA Today, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano defended new airport security measures, just as pat-downs have come under attack via a viral video of a man refusing to have his “junk” touched by TSA officers. Napolitano assured travelrs that the new Advanced Imaging Technology (AIT) units are safe and secure, and described pat-down measures for those who refuse AIT scans. According to Matt Drudge, this means “The Terrorists Have Won!”

To follow up, Napolitano also held a press conference this morning to answer questions about the policies. Video after the jump.

If you needed further evidence that the American right has gone off the rails, Right Wing News (last seen publishing their Conservative New Media Spank Bank) has just put out their list of the 25 Worst Figures in American History (as selected by 43 conservative blogs). Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh could only make it to #9 on the list, while Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama earned the top two spots, respectively. Worst of all, though, is that Snooki doesn’t seem to have gotten a single vote. (h/t Doug Mataconis)

Right-wing media watchdog Newsbusters and influential conservative uber-blogger Ed Morrissey are taking exception to a “Libtalker Meltdown” by my White House press colleague Bill Press. What kind of Toxic Talk did Bill engage in to draw fire from the right? Reacting to a new poll that says 6 in 10 Americans lack faith in President Obama, Press called Americans “spoiled” and “impatient.” I’d say he was being kind.

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.

Hot Air’s Ed Morrissey (one of Matt Lewis‘ Top 25 Twitter Conservatives) scored a hell of an exclusive, giving Nevada candidate for US Senate Sharron Angle a chance to allay concerns that she’s a closet birther. She also took the opportunity to back away from her controversial comments about those spoiled unemployed brats. Angle makes the sale on the first count, but not the second, and doesn’t touch her prescription for 2nd Amendment remedies to legislative ills.

A video parodying the passengers on the Gaza-bound flotilla attacked by Israeli military several weeks ago, entitled “We Con the World,” has been pulled from YouTube, allegedly for a copyright claim from Warner Music, who own the rights to the original Lionel Ritchie/Michael Jackson classic “We are the World.”

The story of John Edwards‘ affair with Rielle Hunter seems to have raised a media meta-quandary about how to treat stories reported by The National Enquirer. Should we report on them? Should we report that they’re being reported? Throw in a Drudge link to an already explosive rumor like, say, the President covering up an affair with a former campaign staffer, and it’s damn near irresistible. There is a responsible way to cover something like this

According to a recent Washington Post report, the Food and Drug Administration is finalizing a plan to reduce the amount of salt in processed foods, one which will eventually include legal limits on the delicious mineral.

Of course, this prompted right-wing sites like Hot Air and Redstate to collectively cry, “…from my cold, dead, perfectly-seasoned fingers!”

Is this really an assault on liberty? Does NaCL need the ACLU? Or is this knee-jerk “nanny state” bleating just pure sel-fishness?

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs tweeted this morning that “Employers added most jobs in 3 years in March,” and although, as Jake Tapper notes, almost a third of those are temporary census jobs, this is unquestionably good news. Well, not for everyone. On the heels of their defeat on health care reform, the GOP has pursued an ill-advised and impossible “repeal and replace” strategy. Once a shoo-in to make big gains in November, the Republicans must now face the nightmare scenario that, given a little bit of help from the economy, Democrats could actually increase their majorities in the midterms.

The Minnesotan billboard caper plot thickens. It took a few weeks of anonymity to discover the culprit’s of last month’s mystery, where a jovial George W. Bush waved at commuters on Interstate 35 with a caption asking “Miss Me Yet?” This time around, however, it isn’t so much of a joke as a direct conservative message: “Remember Real Hope and Change?” it asks, with a picture of Ronald Reagan in a cowboy hat.

On Wednesday night’s Countdown, Keith Olbermann called out several conservative blogs for responding to his Special Comment about the Tea Party’s lack of diversity (without addressing similar charges leveled at his own network). One of the blogs he called out was Hot Air, so I thought I would give Ed Morrissey the chance to respond to Olbermann.

A couple of weeks ago, I asked the burning question “Is Keith Olbermann Losing it?” While I was concerned more with the Countdown host’s loosening perspective, several media critics have since wondered if the show’s ratings portend its imminent demise. As the LA Times’ Andrew Malcolm puts it, are we counting down the last days of Countdown? More importantly, can Countdown be saved? Yup and here’s how.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman is is upset that, for the second time, the President mentioned Las Vegas as a place not to blow your money if you can’t afford it. Oddly, the President has a seemingly unlikely defender in the person of Ed Morrissey, one of the most influential conservative bloggers in existence. Are the President’s pleas for bipartisanship breaking through?