CNN contributor and Editor-in-Chief of Big Journalism Dana Loesch took a lot of flak over the weekend for her declaration of solidarity with the four Marines who videotaped themselves urinating on the corpses of alleged Taliban fighters, in which she said “I’d drop trou and do it too.”

Countdown host Keith Olbermann and liberal watchdog Media Matters, among others, have called for CNN to fire Loesch over the remark, and according to Big Journalism, even Politico is in on the act.

For many for whom Glenn Beck was a program dedicated to misinformation and paranoia, today was a particularly good day. MSNBC’s Cenk Uygur couldn’t contain his glee at Glenn Beck wrapping up his final show today, dedicating to the former Fox News host a montage of controversial clips that “almost makes me tear up,” and discussing with guest Eric Boehlert how Media Matters explains their advertising boycott led to the end of the program.

MSNBC made an interesting choice for guest host last night as Ed Schultz remains on suspension. None other than Rev. Al Sharpton was filling hosting duties. And, while he seemed a bit shaky at times, he got a big boost from the day’s events. Nothing’s going to help endear you to the MSNBC audience like getting to report on the end of Glenn Beck.

On Thursday night’s Hardball, host Chris Matthews was joined by Media Matters‘ Eric Boehlert and Georgetown Professor Michael Eric Dyson to discuss possible 2012 GOP presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee’s recent diarrhea of the mouth regarding President Obama, Mau Maus, and madrassas.

Matthews and panel do a pretty good job of calling out the race-baiting and birther dogwhistling that seems de rigeur for the 2012 crop, but I think they missed a few things.

While the internet went crazy over a 43-second clip from The O’Reilly Factor that seemed to catch the show in a lie, Mediaite exonerated The Factor by looking at a longer stretch of the same episode. Of course, context isn’t enough for some people, including The Colbert Report‘s Stephen Colbert, who trained his satirical sights on “Papa Bear” Bill O’Reilly‘s use of palm tree-laden footage during an interview about Wisconsin protesters even though he knew about the context provided by the earlier use of the footage.

Media Matters’ Eric Boehlert visited liberal radio host Stephanie Miller‘s show Monday to share his thoughts about the union protests in Wisconsin – including one protester’s decision to hit Fox News reporter Mike Tobin as he attempted to cover the event.

In response to the network’s complaints about the behavior and animosity of the protesters, Boehlert told a chuckling Miller that “you just gotta laugh” over the fact that Tobin and his colleague, Gregg Jarrett, have been discussing the incident at length – “this coming from someone,” Boehlert said, “who works for a station that essentially concocts hate on an hourly basis.”

Last Thursday, Media Matters published an extensive (and somewhat breathless) account from an anonymously sourced individual that was only identified as a former Fox News Insider. The report included lots of detail that alleged Fox News’ bias, with pithy quotes like “they’re a propaganda outfit but they call themselves news” and “stuff is just made up,” and was clearly intended as a scathing indictment of Media Matters’ mortal enemy, Fox News. But the story made barely a ripple in mainstream news outlets, and ended up serving as a stark reminder of Media Matters’ growing irrelevance in the world of media criticism.

Right near the end of a segment examining the continued relevance of Newt Gingrich, Hardball host Chris Matthews made a comment that probably seemed offhand to most viewers, but not all. In a modern media warscape that has each side out to convince itself of the sinister, conspiratorial bias of the other, Matthews’ comment to Media Matters senior fellow Eric Boehlert regarding the media watchdog, to keep posting the information because “we rely on it,” probably set off blaring sirens at the Media Research Center.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has evolved into both one of the most polarizing voices in the right wing of the country, taking a strong stand against replacing the Constitution with Sharia Law and attacking President Barack Obama‘s Kenyan roots, and one of the most respected, even being tossed around as a potential presidential candidate. For some, his political status is a given. For Chris Matthews, it’s a complete mystery.

It’s been only a few weeks since Media Matters Senior Fellow Eric Boehlert enacted a mutual detente with arch frenemy Andrew Breitbart, but Boehlert hasn’t shied away from making new foes, the loudest of which is Fox News’ Red Eye host (and future Muslim gay bar proprietor) Greg Gutfeld. After allegedly tweeting “EPIC FAIL” at him, Gutfeld dedicated a special Greg-a-logue (and Robot Theater!) to his new rival.

Nevada Republican Senate Candidate Sharron Angle shocked Fox News’ Carl Cameron recently when she bluntly explained that she wanted journalists to ask her prepackaged questions. Despite Cameron’s reaction, on tonight’s Hardball Chris Matthews attacked the network (though excluded Cameron and a few others) for being a 24-hour “infomercial,” and deriding the “culture” over at Fox News.

Judged purely by their back and forth on Twitter over the last six months, its safe to say that Andrew Breitbart and Eric Boehlert are not very fond of one another. In fact, it’s fair to say that they each hold the other in the lowest possible esteem. So it was with great anticipation that followers of both feisty Internet personalities tuned into Good Morning America this morning to see two debate the Shirley Sherrod controversy. Mediaite spoke to both gentlemen about the exchange.

Fox News’ late night comedy/news show Red Eye explored a topic raised by The Washington Post‘s Dave Weigel last week – Andrew Breitbart‘s new Twitter image.

With Breitbart in studio, ombudsman Andy Levy got the answer right from the source – what’s with the Eric Boehlert lookalike picture?

Is Glenn Beck’s time in the media klieg lights coming to a close? The latest Nielsen numbers reveal that Beck’s audience is down nearly 30% since the start of the year. But why the drop (if, indeed, there even is one)? Is the country growing bored of chalkboards, or is the larger issue that the nation is merely out-Becking Glenn Beck?

Media Matters celebrated Tax Day yesterday by penning an optimistic take on Glenn Beck‘s seemingly unstoppable ratings success: the glory days are over. In an analysis aided by Daily Kos, Eric Boehlert asks readers, “Did Glenn Beck Just Post a New Ratings Low for 2010?” Well, if you include weekend rerun data and holidays in the study, then yes.