Quotes of the Day

CONTEMPLATIVE: “Getting ready for Meet the Press this morning from Richmond” — House Maj. Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) in a moment of deep, meditative, almost wax figure silence before going on the program.

“Okay, buddy. Great night. Get some sleep. In about 72 hours, Axelrod’s gonna be looking for us.” — Joe’s Mustache (@AMJoesMoustache) to MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough, who made a campaign bet last week that will either have him growing a stache or Obama Campaign Advisor David Axelrod shaving his off.

Sunday morning at 4:38 a.m.: “I would like about 3 more hours of sleep. Instead: DCA.” — Yahoo! News’ Olivier Knox.

Journo hears anti-gay sentiment on trail

“An irate attendee at this Boehner event in OH told me she opposes Obama because ‘he’s forcing through this gay shit.’ Alrighty then!” — HuffPost‘s Jennifer Bendery.

Editor invents new Twitter terminology

“Defining new term: Twitter War Hostage| when yr handle gets dragged along in twitter fight btw 2 others long after u have anything 2do w/it.” — TPM Editor Josh Marshall.

Journo nightmare

“I had a terrible dream that I set my clock back and it was Nov. 4, 2011.” — Politico‘s Maggie Haberman.

On Saturday night NBC “MTP’s” David Gregory encouraged everyone to have fun with daylight savings: “My feeling is don”t wait until 2am to turn your clocks back. Have some fun with it. Do it now.”

Editor wrestles with cat’s underarm hair

“Spent half an hour untangling my cat’s underarm hair – finally had to give up and cut out a matted hunk #MaineCoonproblems.” — Washington Gardener Editor Kathy Jentz, who clearly made the most of her daylight savings time this weekend.

Anticipation: “Moving to my third coffee shop of the day. … But, I’m thinking y’all will think this story is worth it.” — BuzzFeed‘s Chris Geidner. Anticipation II: “Hour 19 of today: waiting. waiting. and more waiting. We cannot wait to actually have control of our own lives.” — LAT‘s Maeve Reston.

Captain Obvious: “In three days, we’ll know who the president will be for the next four years! Barack Obama or Mitt Romney?” — The Daily Caller‘s Matthew Boyle. What?!?! Is there an election??? We’re thinking he should stick with stories on senators and Dominican prostitutes.

Irony is…

“Starbucks Dupont believes in overheating its coffee to mouth-scalding temperatures but they’re too cheap to turn on the friggin’ heat.” — MetroWeekly‘s Randy Shulman.

FNC’s ‘Fair and Balanced’ reaches preposterous proportions

“Fox News anchor: If viewers want ‘far-left’ news, they go to MSNBC. If they want ‘fair and balanced,’ they come here.” — HuffPost‘s Amanda Terkel.

D.C. publicist would rather do anything than watch Sen. Rob Portman. And which Politico reporter basically tells complaining NY marathoners to STFU? Also: journo witness to giant car wreck caused by a bear.

Read more

BuzzFeed‘s McKay Coppins is catching flack for characterizing claims in a Mitt Romney campaign ad as “misleading” rather than “a lie.”

“There’s really no good explanation or excuse for it,” Coppins tweeted out. “Mitt Romney’s Jeep ad is misleading. Full stop.” The ad in question states that President Obama, through the auto-bailout, “sold Chrysler to Italians, who are going to build Jeeps in China.” The claim has faced criticism for not providing a full context that even though Jeeps will be made in China, Chrysler’s existing workforce in America will remain.

“It’s a bald faced lie,” MSNBC’s Goldie Taylor shouted at Coppins, who also received the equivalent of rotten tomatoes from a certain Washington editor… Read more

QUOTES of the DAY

“I dunno how politicians wake up each morning and forget every phone everywhere is a multimedia recording device, but thank god they do.” — BuzzFeed Washington Bureau Chief John Stanton.

Round 2: Hilary Versus the Romneys?

“The disdain Romney has for those who’ve lived differently than his privileged family flows from every pore. #Sad” — CNN Democratic Political Analyst Hilary Rosen, who links to this story by TPM about Mitt Romney headlined “Devastated.”

TPM Editor gives Mojo’s David Corn a big warm hug 

“I don’t know the provenance of the tape. It’s apparently been bouncing around on the interwebs before getting published by Mother Jones. But I know David Corn. And he wouldn’t have posted it under his name if he weren’t pretty certain he had the authenticity of the tape nailed. So I’m assuming the tape is legit for the purposes of what I say below.” — TPM Editor Josh Marshall, who said he was on vacation and on “half-watching” the news on Monday.

An intriguing idea

“Starting [today], Romney campaign will allow cameras into fundraisers held at public venues. Up until now, was pen and pad only.” — ABC News Producer Emily Friedman. Or maybe that’s not such a hot idea…“Sound rule of thumb, for presidential candidates and everyone else alike: It’s always worse if there’s video.” — The Hill‘s Niall Stanage.

TV journo gets weight question

“Yep – trying – amazing when you eat better and exercise – what can happen -thnx.” — FNC’s Bret Baier to a follower who asked, “You losing weight?” It just so happens that Baier was recognized as one of the journos in need of a salad in our Summer Superlatives. The other was his colleague, Bob Beckel.

Reporter wonders if she’s the devil

“I have 6666 followers. Does that make me the devil?” — HuffPost‘s Elise Foley. (We’re sorry to break it to you here, like this, Elise, but yes, you might be the devil.)

Chef Geoff gets journo love

“@chefgeoffs Great news. Kid says yours is the best burger of all of the spots we go to. Has already asked to return. (Cheers to Norah)” — Yahoo! News’ Olivier Knox.

Convo Between Two Journos

Today’s conversation is between The Atlantic’s David Graham and The Guardian and Salon‘s Jim Newell, who formerly worked at Gawker.

Graham: Worth nothing Newsweek recently let go ace Middle East reporter Babak Dehghanpisheh in Beirut. So instead we get Ayaan Hirsi Ali retreads.

The Fashionista 

“LOVE Chris Matthews special Yom Tov shirt & tie combo! So festive! #hardball.” — Rachel Sklar on Matthews, who wore a red and white striped button down with a red polka dot and striped tie on Monday’s program.

Newell: So is Newsweek now like Gawker where the former writers shit all over it as soon as they leave?

 Graham: I’m really, really trying not to.

The liberal media hater

“Jonathan @capehart on MSNBC mocking @RickSantorum over ‘elite’ comments. This would be funny, if it weren’t so pathetically sad.” — Conservative blogger Robert Stacy McCain. Jonathan Capehart is a left-wing op-ed writer for WaPo and an MSNBC Contributor.

Important Questions to Ponder: “We are discussing Kate Middleton…is the topless photos a big deal as the Royal Family is making it? Would you buy the photos? #tmzlive” — TMZ Founder Harvey Levin. And from FNC’s Greta Van Susteren: “KATE MIDDLETON PICS POLL – did you? or didn’t you? click, read and vote: Take Our poll.” Take Greta’s poll here.

Brrr!

“It’s so cold in my office, my fingernails are purple. This device is clearly ignoring my request.” — Erica Elliott, Comm. Director for House Maj. Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.).

Peter Ogburn contributed to this report.

Earlier in the year, TPM promoted Callie Schweitzer to Deputy Publisher just six short months after she arrived at the news outlet. Now the 23-year-old is on the move again. This time to Vox Media as Director of Marketing and Special Projects. Vox owns SB Nation, The Verge and Polygon.

Schweitzer is formerly the editor-in-chief of 24/7 Neon Tommy site.

Why move so soon after being promoted at TPM? “It’s an amazing opportunity at a phenomenal company, and I’m so excited,” she told FishbowlDC. Careful to not burn any bridges, she explained, “I had the greatest experience at TPM, but it was an amazing opportunity that I couldn’t turn down. I’m so grateful to Josh Marshall for the phenomenal opportunities he gave me.”

Schweitzer begins her new job today.

Quotes of the Day

Cell Phone Abuse! “Alarm… Set! (Yeah yeah, fixing my shattered phone tomorrow. Oh Apple store… I am coming for u!)” — CNN Correspondent Brooke Baldwin.

Josh Marshall dings Politifact

“Awesome: Politifact manages to ‘fact-check’ a claim which is totally unsubstantianted [sic] and still look like idiots.” — TPM‘s Josh Marshall. Read the Politifact story here.  

You can’t take WaPo‘s White House scribe anywhere

“Your pooler also notes that David Nakamura, all around good guy and great co-pooler, accidentally spilled his Cobb salad on the plane’s brand new carpet. and promptly cleaned up the mess thoroughly.” — TWT‘s David Boyer in a Monday Pool Report. AF1 was en route to JFK where they were catching helos to Stamford, Conn. for two fundraisers. WaPo‘s David Nakamura needn’t worry. The oil should blend in seamlessly.

Blogger lashes out about masturbatory tweet

Last week DCStakeOut blogger and Institute of Public Accuracy’s Sam Husseini wrote a tongue-in-cheek tweet upon the death of Gore Vidal. Like Vidal, Husseini wrote that he, too, had a lot of sex. “Like Gore Vidal, I had 1000 sexual encounters by the time I was 25. Of course, I was the only one in the room for most.” We ran it in Morning Chatter with the headline, “Blogger (jokingly) boasts of sexual prowess?” And guess who flipped out yesterday on Twitter? “How is that boasting of sexual prowess?” he asked on Twitter. He said somehow we didn’t get that he meant that he’d been, ahem, polishing the family jewels, not sleeping with 1000 people. Thanks for that Husseini! We’re such idiots and wouldn’t have possibly gotten that without your help. When we joked that we needed to add an update and pronto, he snapped, “@FishbowlDC You do that. Learn to read while you’re at it. You’re literally the only person who didn’t get that.” Some might remember Husseini. He was suspended from the National Press Club in November of 2011 after he questioned Saudi Arabian Prince Turki al-Faisal in a way head honchos found “unseemly” and then became outraged when NPC officials somehow didn’t want him acting like an asshole brave journo toward their guests. He was eventually taken off suspension but not without club officials thinking him a nuisance. This was the second time he’d been suspended.

Journo alerts the masses on addiction story

“Doing a deep dive into the scientific literature on addiction. So fascinating. Also, feel free to holler if this is your field. #longwrites” — The Atlantic‘s Alexis Madrigal.

Headline from the AP in London: “Man Sets Fire to Home by Microwaving Socks, Undies.” Read the story here.

Reason.com had plastic surgery this week and all-in-all, it’s shaping up into a good thing.

The site is clean with plenty of white space. There’s a lot of content on the front page but it’s neatly compartmentalized as to not be overwhelming. Featured stories transition smoothly in a slideshow near the top of the page. Just below is a long list of the sites “top stories.”

Flanked on either side of the featured stories are links to Reason‘s two news blogs (which are also linked with verticals at the very top of the page), “Reason 24/7″ and “Hit & Run.”

The 24/7 blog is simply a curator of news from other sites. Each post pulls a couple paragraphs directly from a story, links to the original source and puts it under a slightly tweaked headline. Hit & Run has original posts with news analysis by Reason writers.

In the left column on the front page, under the 24/7 blog link, is a box that shows the Reason.com stories trending on Facebook. That’s different and more interesting than the typical “Most Visited” stories box (though the site has one of those, too).

The ReasonTV portion of the site is as it has always been– original Reason videos on libertarian topics. A box featuring some of the videos is placed in the right column of the front page, just below the Hit & Run blog.

For polling data freaks like TPM‘s Josh Marshall, there’s a vertical dedicated specifically to polls and surveys related to all types of current events from the presidential election to the big-soda ban in New York City.

Speaking verticals, the verticals bar at the top might be the site’s best feature. As with many news sites, there are verticals broken up by topic such as “economics,” “politics” and “culture.” But users often have to click each one individually to see what stories they lead to. Reason‘s verticals drop down when the cursor hovers over them to show photos and headlines behind each.

Three words: Fab. U. Lous.

Something has really gotten into TPM Founder and Editor Josh Marshall because he’d like to thank everyone between here and Thailand for the new polling app being unveiled today.

For political junkies who can’t wait another moment to find out how their candidate is faring down to the nanosecond, stop breathing because this is the app for you. PollTracker Mobile is the iPhone version of TPM‘s Media’s PollTracker poll aggregator. It’s free, and, according to Josh, “beyond question” the best polling device of the 2012 cycle.

“For me, finding out a day or even a few hours later that a big presidential poll came out isn’t good enough,” a bursting Josh writes in a morning note to readers. “I want to know right away. Like — gimme my crack! — right away.” Find it here before the DT’s set in.

Marshall’s note includes, count ‘em, five graphs of thank yous to everyone from the two dudes who created it, to the entire digital team that built the app, to a professor at the University of Wisconsin, their whole team and the business development team. Lock your doors, because absolutely no one is safe from Marshall’s tornado of thank yous today. But what, no love for those who birthed him? He’ll be kicking himself in the shins later as he clearly forgot to thank his Kindergarten teacher and whoever taught him to tie his shoes and cut his nose hair.

Quotes of the Day

Journo turns “Rachel” into a verb

“Will ‘Rachel’ at 9:15pmish. My @maddow debut.” — WaPo‘s Jonathan Capehart.

Question to Ponder: “How big does your house have to be to be a compound? #kennedys #romneys” — TPM Founder and Editor Josh Marshall.

Humblebragalicious Shuster has friends on the right?

“Look, when I do talk to my more intellectual friends on the right, and I do have some…” — Lefty journo David Shuster filling in as host of Current TV’s “Full Court Press” this morning in a segment bashing Fox News. Later he added, “By the way, full disclosure, I worked at Fox News in 96 to about 2001, but the organization changed and it was starting to trend in a certain way that I felt uncomfortable with. So it was sort of a mutual agreement that I would leave. I was eager to leave. I had caused enough trouble over there that they were eager to have me leave.”

Whoa! Journo praises Amtrak?

“Endless #Amtrak ride wasn’t endless after all. Remarkably gracious staff, calm passengers made slow, dud-engined ride oddly pleasant.” — National Review‘s Kathryn Lopez.

CNN’s Anderson Cooper hints at sexual orientation

“Anderson Cooper sort of outed himself on Kathy Griffin‘s show. Woman jokes they’re dating. AC: ‘Hate to break it to you, not gonna happen.’” — Politico‘s Jennifer Epstein.

Convo Between Two Journos: Cillizza to face dental procedure

This morning’s conversation is between WaPo’s Nurse Jackie impersonator Chris Cillizza and CNN’s Lizzie O’Leary. Let’s hope to God Cillizza live tweets the procedure.

Cillizza: Things I would rather do than get a wisdom tooth pulled tomorrow: anything.

O’Leary: Don’t be a wuss. plus, the drugs are awesome.

Cillizza: I am a wuss.

Politico producer weighs in on color of green tea

“Green tea is really more of a yellowy-orange, wouldn’t you say? #thursdaythoughts” — Politico web producer Leigh Munsil. She may have a point here.

Bureau Chief unashamed of liking ‘The Newsroom’

“So it seems I am destined to be the only person that will like @HBO’s #Newsroom. But I’m prepared for that.” — Yahoo! News‘ Washington Bureau Chief David Chalian.

The wild game of musical chairs among Washington’s political publications continues this week. Talking Points Memo has hired a new VP of Ad Sales in their Washington bureau. Mary Cadwallader comes to TPM from The Hill where she was National Sales Manager. Before that she was at CQ Roll Call for five years.

As we reported last week, two members of Bloomberg Gov.’s sales team have resigned to return to CQ Roll Call.

“I am so pleased to welcome Mary to the TPM team,” said TPM founder and Editor and Publisher Josh Marshall. “Mary’s deep experience in energy, transportation, technology and healthcare — new areas of fast growth for TPM — impressed us all.”

Quotes of the Day

Ouch!

HBO comedian Bill Maher performing last night at Rockville, Md.’s Strathmore auditorium: “To me, John Boehner feels female. He wears a lot of bronzer and cries a lot. I need to see his d!@k. The short form.” (Maher in a riff on Republicans saying President Obama feels foreign.) More on the show later…

George preps for Katie

“Hey @katiecouric, George is getting ready for you! He’s doing push-ups, wearing an algae face mask and getting a pedicure! #GMA” — Ali Wentworth, author of the new memoir Ali in Wonderland, comedian and wife of ABC “This Week” and GMA host George Stephanopoulos.

WTF: Reporter did what?

“Fed a dachshund some bear meat. Enjoy little dog. That would never happen in the wild.” — Politico White House reporter Byron Tau. In June of 2011, Tau’s affinity for dogs was questioned when he cracked on Washingtonian for their “hard hitting” story on Beagles. But Tau’s innocence was proven. See here.

Procession of TV losers

“Current TV replaces Keith Olbermann with Eliot Spitzer. Who’s next, John Edwards?” — TWT Senior Opinion Writer Emily Miller.

The Media Observer

“Between Grassley vs. History Channel and Chambliss vs. C-SPAN, Republicans have chosen some odd parts of the media to be mad at.” — The Atlantic‘s Molly Ball.

April Fools’ Tentativeness

“When deciding to go with the fake news story for April Fool’s Day, never forget the audience’s capacity not to grasp comedy.” — Mark Joyella, Digital Producer for CNN’s Erin Burnett‘s Out Front.

“Always trying to remember: completely ridiculous things I hear on 4/1 prolly aren’t true #winning.” – TPM founder and Editor Josh Marshall, who prolly should use the word “probably” if he doesn’t want to sound like he’s from Hee Haw.

“The funniest part about April Fools’ Day to me every year? The constant misspelling of the actual title.” — WaPo Express‘ Clinton Yates.

Sightings: On Friday night, Townhall.com’s Kevin Glass was spotted enjoying a beer with a  friend at Millie & Al’s bar on 18th Street. On Saturday night Politico‘s Jedd Rosche was spotted at a college-themed party near U Street.

WaPo Gene Weingarten’s ingenious idea

“Twitter should offer a 20-second ‘undo’ option. A cooling-off period for drunks and hotheads.” — WaPo humor columnist Gene Weingarten, who can be quite the bitch on Twitter and over email.

Is bacon really good with everything?

“I was kinda expecting the @FreeBeacon to change its name to the Free Bacon and write stories about bacon and how CAP uses ‘Bacon-first’” — Matt DeLuca, Communications Strategist for New Media Strategies.

Journo consumes heart attack-worthy cuisine

“Just perpetrated a High-larious April Fools on my heart: wolfed down a bubbling crock of jalapeno-laced cheeseburger dip #coronaryhereIcome” — Roll Call HOH’s Warren Rojas.

Journo Love

“Jake Tapper with striped suit, haircut and oh, yeah, real talent does a great job anchoring the ABC World News” — Politico‘s Roger Simon.

Peter Ogburn and Eddie Scarry contributed to this report.