On Tuesday evening, shockwaves blasted through the Twitterverse as the Drudge Report website put up a siren and claimed to be dropping a bombshell that would rock this Presidential election. A story from The Daily Caller would be unveiled on Fox News at 9pm ET that Drudge calls the “EXCLUSIVE RELEASE OF ‘UNSCRUBBED’ OBAMA VIDEO.” Could this be the rumored “Whitey” tape? Could it be Obama dressed as Malcolm X for Halloween? WHAT COULD IT BE????

Drudge and The Daily Caller gave hints by releasing excerpts of what to expect when the tape aired. In doing this, it propped opened the door for people to rush online and try to find what was in the video before it even aired. Leading this charge were the muckrakers at Buzzfeed, who seemed to find the speech in a matter of minutes. Daily Caller’s media reporter, Jeff Poor quickly weighed in, tweeting, “Question: Why is @Buzzfeed working so hard to get to the smoking gun in this video? You guys can’t wait until 9 pm? Go have dinner… Relax ” Journos from all over Twitter took Poor’s bait and began arguing over who had the right to scoop this story. Politico’s Jake Sherman responded to Poor saying, “It’s called journalism. They want to be first. The name of the game.” He went on and tweeted, “Of course an outlet would try to chase it. Why not? We’re all competitive!”  Buzzfeed’s McKay Coppins weighed in and asked Poor, “Better question: Why are you waiting until 9:00 pm to publish the ‘smoking gun?’” Poor’s response was simply, “Umm.. because we can. But if you get off of Twitter, you might beat us by 9 if you keep up this great detective work.”

In the end, Tucker Carlson went on Sean Hannity’s show Tuesday night and aired the videos which, by most accounts, fell flat. So, who ended up with the scoop? Did Buzzfeed cross any journalistic lines? Or did The Daily Caller tip their hand too early?

In the latest video feature from The Hill’s Howiella Judy Kurtz, the publication rolls out the red carpet and takes us to Tinseltown for their “Red Carpet Rundown.” I’ll give credit where it’s due: Judy is comfortable in front of the camera and does a decent job of delivering her content. Everything else, however, is a different story. For starters, can they not get a better backdrop? Obviously, those aren’t REAL lights and cameras. It’s a green screen. Hell, they could have put ANYTHING back there. Personally, just a giant Howard Kurtz head would have made me watch a lot longer.

Secondly, what’s with the content? This whole thing gets teed up like it’s the frigging Oscars and she mentions a book party that The Daily Caller is having for it’s new book about President Obama being a lizard or something like that. That’s what she LEADS with. The followup is the story about those two little media personalities known as Jon Stewart and Bill O’Reilly. Good idea to bury that item. Then again, it’s not like she gives ANY new info on the event they are having. We are told when and where the event takes place, but that was news two weeks ago. Oh, but she also tells us that they plan to “debate political issues.” No shit? They’re debating politics? Those two guys? Weird. I figured they were going to have an extended banjo-picking jam session.

As many media types know, WaPo‘s premier gossip column, The UnReliable Sources as we’ve come to call them, are the town’s slowpokes. This afternoon they publish the “news” of MSNBC’s Thomas Roberts wedding to Patrick Abner. Roberts is the first national anchor to wed a same-sex partner. Of course, it’s not news. It’s also not Washington — it’s New York. The wedding was Saturday and has already been reported in the Daily Mail, Mediaite, HuffPost, BuzzFeed and more.

So why not report it Tuesday?

Maybe they figure gossip is like weather, it starts elsewhere and moves here a day or two later. Or maybe this is one of the reasons why Washington D.C. gossip sucks.

Earlier in the week, we alerted you to one of our recent Dumbass Pitches that involved the classic rock group, Bachman-Turner Overdrive. Today, we stick with the theme and bring you our latest Dumbass Pitch from Judy Collins. We get so many dumbass pitches here in the Fishbowl, that we decided we can’t just keep them to ourselves. We have to share them with you. Collins has a book out called SWEET JUDY BLUE EYES: My Life in Music. Collins, a folk-singer and the inspiration for the Crosby, Stills and Nash’s “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes”, has seen a lot. She’d like to tell you all about in her book. What can we find out? For starters, we hear all about how she was at the forefront of the Vietnam protests and shaped a generation. Of course, there’s a twist. The pitch says, “Yet Judy Collins’s personal life was anything but clear and hopeful, and as her career skyrocketed, her battles with depression, addiction, and heartache escalated as well.” So, how is this different from every other musician that came from the Sixties?

We can learn more than we ever needed or wanted to know about Judy. Here’s an excerpt from the book description:

“As her young marriage to Peter Taylor fell apart, Collins entered a world of experimentation and freedom from inhibitions, yet she craved emotional connections as much as physical ones. Throughout this memoir, she
describes the intense highs and lows she reached in love, often with musicians and producers—reaching a calamitous, beautiful zenith with Stephen Stills and culminating in a tender romance with Louis Nelson, her husband and soul mate, who has been in her life for more than thirty years.”

We are told that even through all the trials, Judy is “grateful for the gift of music.” Hope it was all worth it Judy!

In other Dumbass Pitch news, we got a pitch to talk to Irwin Yablans. Yes, THE Irwin Yablans. If you don’t know, he is the creator or the “Halloween” movie franchise. He is being pitched for no product in particular. Just that he can talk about Halloween and why audiences like to be scared. Riveting! Funny how the pitch ONLY mentions the Halloween movie franchise. They don’t mention that he was the producer on other smash hits like “Blood Beach”, “Roller Boogie”, and “Nocturna: Granddaughter of Dracula.” Here is a sampling of some of the spellbinding questions that they suggest we could ask Mr. Yablans:

• What forced you into becoming an independent producer?

• How did you first break into the business?

• As a poor kid growing up in Brooklyn, did you ever  think you could become a success in Hollywood?

In other words…  All about him and not as much about Halloween. That is a truly scary Dumbass Pitch.

As journos in Charlotte look for new and different ways to cover the DNC, Politico’s Senior Political Reporter Jonathan Martin has a unique idea. Write tweets that make you sound like a maniac. Just look at the gobbledygook he tweeted Wednesday night as America basked in the glow of the Bill Clinton speech.

As wjc and bho walked behind curtain backstage and out of view they put arms around one another’s backs

— jmartpolitico (@jmartpolitico) September 6, 2012

Great scoop! Considering they just embraced in front of a national TV audience, is it really news that they put their arms around each other in the moments after?  

As Clinton’s speech dragged on and on, people wondered how long he could keep it up.  JMart chimed in, too.  

He cud go til halloween for this crowd

— jmartpolitico (@jmartpolitico) September 6, 2012

Oh, really, JMart? CUD he? Cud he really?!?!  This is what drives us crazy about the JMart tweets. There’s no good reason at all to shorten “Could” to “Cud” in that tweet. It just makes it look like you are a crazy person who can’t read or write.

In a brave new nasty world of online reporting, things can get twitchy.

Today, Twitchy, the right-leaning site that highlights weird or entertaining happenings on Twitter, engaged in a battle of wits with WaPo‘s left-wing blogger Ezra Klein.

Twitchy went after Klein on a nuance of a technicality. In other words, he made a mistake, they went after him for a post one of his writers did on VP Paul Ryan saying the Janesville plant shut down during the Obama Administration and then they nailed him for what they deemed was his not properly highlighting the mistake. Klein’s blog maintains that Ryan was misleading. The decision to close the plant was made during the Bush Administration. The actual shut-down happened under Obama’s leadership.

Twitchy thinks Klein needs to apologize for being a liar. “We are right,” Klein tweeted in response to their accusations. Somehow we don’t see an apology happening in this century.

Take a look here. See the latest version of post that started the squabble here.

While The Daily Caller and Michelle Fields recently parted ways, she appears to be staying very busy. She continues to tweet throughout the day on topics ranging from Ron Paul to the recent engagement of former South Carolina Republican Gov. Mark Sanford. Her unemployment hasn’t stop her from patting herself on the back and posting several photos of herself to Facebook, as you can see by the screenshots of herself on the right.

While her immediate plans weren’t made clear when The Daily Caller showed her the door, she hinted at what might be next for her in a Facebook post. As you can see by the screengrab on the right, one of her “friends” asked if she was “ready to write a book about politics.”

Obviously, this is a ridiculous question.

What on earth would she have to say about politics? Even if you were to give Fields credit for her catalog of work, it has very little to do with politics. If publishers were looking for someone to write a book called, How to Get Pushed to the Ground and Called a C#*T by the Tea Party for Dummies, she’d be perfect.

Hell, I might even read that book.

The Daily Caller’s Matt Lewis was on vacation last week, so he was running “best of” columns to fill the void. The one he chose to run on Thursday gives Mediaite’s Tommy Christopher a run for his money in the “most pathetic and desperate ‘please book me on your show’ ass-kissing award.” Whereas Christopher kisses the asses of Chris Hayes and Cenk Uygur, Lewis at least spends his time kissing an ass that has some viewers – MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough.

Of the “Morning Joe” host, Lewis writes, “…Scarborough, host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” arguably does more to advance conservative ideas than many of the more-celebrated conservative voices in America today. Primarily this is because — unlike those others — Scarborough isn’t just preaching to the choir.”

Before he left, the noted Twitter-butt-kisser told his followers that his column would be running “evergreen ‘greatest hits’ all week.” How a column he wrote back in his Politics Daily days and not one of the many DC pieces he’s authored in his time there qualifies as a “greatest hit” speaks volumes of what Lewis must think of his work at his current employer. Then again, he did say “evergreen” and Washington, ass-kissing never goes out of style.

While on vacation, Lewis found time to retweet his betrothed’s “Thank!” Will this lead to more bookings? Probably. But I mostly kid Matt because he’s notorious for retweeting praise from anyone on Twitter. I hope his vacation was enjoyable and his lips are rested, as I’m certain they’ll be put back to use in no time.

With all the hype surrounding the launch of HuffPost Live, we were expecting to tune in to see an extravaganza like nothing we’d ever seen before. Imagine the shock when I tuned in this morning to see a young, diverse staff on a stylish set talking about news of the day. The news, when I tuned in, was Julian Assange being granted asylum in Ecuador. The hosts, Ahmed Shihab-Eldin, Abby Huntsman, and Marc Lamont Hill, sat on a comfy set with a giant leather sofa. (We hope that’s faux-leather to avoid pissing off the base.) Analysis from the team doesn’t dig too deep in the issues. At one point, Huntsman chimes in that since her father, former GOP Presidential candidate Jon Huntsman, was ambassador to China, this issue of asylum was “very sensitive” to her. Sure, Abby..  We’re sure this is REALLY tough for you.

The program has an unpolished quality that you will either find refreshing or amateur hour, depending on your mood. While the hosts haven’t fully committed to any kind of real look, Shihab-Eldin is a pair of suspenders away from being classified as a full blown hipster. One of the best features of the broadcast is watching the running commentary from viewers as the show runs live. While the hosts will read some of the comments on air, they didn’t read this one, from Hashhero. Hash says, “I’m logging off until Abby’s off camera. She reminds me of Elizabeth Hasslebeck, who is also very annoying.”

“AMERICA has a proud history of drinking on the job.” That’s the opening line to this piece from The Economist. It’s an interesting way to grab my attention. Who doesn’t long for the good old days of chugging a flask of gin before stepping into the office to face your asshole boss? We are told that the scenes in “Mad Men” where we see men in suits guzzling scotch in the middle of the day are closer to reality than most Americans might realize. But, wait! They bring research into the mix! They say, “Another recent paper from the journal Consciousness and Cognition by psychologists at the University of Illinois confirms what many have long suspected: a couple of drinks makes workers more creative.” It’s true. After I’ve swilled a few gin and tonics, I think I’m a creative genius. But, having more ideas doesn’t mean I’m necessarily having better ideas.

It’s hard to imagine that a respected publication makes a serious case for getting drunk at work. Yet, here is The Economist trying to make that case. It’s a bizarre cause to take up, but considering The Economist owns CQ Roll Call, there are some recently fired employees who could probably use a drink AND a job right now. In fact, former Roll Call-er Ryan Beckwith baited current RC-er Amanda Becker on Twitter, saying, “I dare you to bring a six pack to work tomorrow with a copy of that editorial and leave it on the free food counter.”

Amanda, we’re here for moral support.