The gang from R to L: WSJ’s Danny Yadron and Andrew Grossman, Sahil Kapur from TPM, Politico‘s Tim Mak and Emily Schultheis, and Asawin Suebsaeng from Mother Jones and his girlfriend.

Earlier this week, friends of National Journal‘s new tech reporter, Brian Fung, former an associate editor for The Atlantic, drank to his success at Shaw Tavern while he was markedly absent.

Dinner apparently ran late, causing him to miss the festivities. But friends kindly toasted to him anyhow. “Congrats to @b_fung on your new job,” cracked Politico‘s Byron Tau on Twitter. “Wish you could have made it to your own party!”

We asked Fung about missing out. He replied, “I had a bit of an accidental scheduling conflict that evening. Serves me right — you live by the meme, you die by the meme.”

When we first showed up to last night’s screening of ZeroDarkThirty at the Newsuem, Politico‘s Tim Mak was persuading a press handler to let him inside the event. He had a ticket in hand but wasn’t on the list.

“There are already two others from Politico on our list,” the handler told Mak. A few minutes later, however, we spotted a happy Mak walking around with what appeared to be a glass of champagne in hand. The crisis wherein Politico would only have two reporters covering an event was averted.

Much of the news media who showed up to the screening weren’t as lucky. They (FishbowlDC included) weren’t allowed in to see the actual movie, a film about the hunt for Osama bin Laden, and were limited to red carpet coverage.

Still, there was plenty of weirdness to see.  Read more

What was initially thought to be a special appearance by David Martosko‘s personal secretary at last night’s Daily Caller book launch party ended up being nothing of the sort.

To the left is a photo of Nandi, who works with Emperor Vodka, which sponsored the soiree. “I’m just here for pictures,” she said, graciously posing for cameras. Nandi, whose arms are reminiscent of Angela Bassett‘s What’s Love Got to Do with It, said this was her first time working with Emperor. Fun first day on the job!

The Daily Caller hosted the party in its Farragut Square newsroom celebrating The Lizard King, an ebook written by their own Jamie Weinstein and Will Rahn.

“I have no good answer,” said Rahn when asked who should read his book. “It’s a transformative book,” he said (“transformational” also works). He compared it to reading the Bible. “Is this off the record?” Rahn asked at the conclusion of our interview.

Weinstein was a little more willing to talk about the book, though we get the impression he thought he was on TV. “Truth-seekers will like it,” Weinstein said. He emphasized that the book is actually a manuscript provided by a White House insider and that he and Rahn are simply the vessels through which the book is being delivered. “Once in a while, history falls upon you and I think it happened to us,” he said, adding that it “may be one of the most important books since [Fox News host] Sean Hannity’s book.”

The Daily Caller‘s bar was stocked with wine, soda, alcohol and a beer tap that poured Pabst Blue Ribbon. Edibles (vegetables and a few hors d’oeurves) were a little on the slim side.

As guests trickled in, a couple faces stood out in the crowd: Politico‘s Byron Tau and Tim Mak. The DC and Politico have been known to publicly quibble in the past. One Daily Caller staffer said the relationship between the two publications “on paper” is often not the case between individual reporters. He said there are several Politico employees he regularly drinks with. Both Tau and Mak chatted with The DC‘s Alex Pappas for a while, as well.

In the crowd we also spotted a distinguished gentleman with a badass eye patch. It turned out to be Will Rahn’s father, ex-husband to WSJ‘s Peggy Noonan.

The DC‘s editor Tucker Carlson was seen talking with RollCall‘s Jonathan Strong, a former Daily Caller reporter. Strong said work for him has been slow and “a little boring,” given he covers Congress, which is currently out of session.

Notables: The Daily Caller‘s Alex Treadway, Sarah Hoffman, Taylor Bigler, Jeff Poor, Caroline May, Brian Danza, Chris Bedford, Neil Munro, Pat McMahon, Nicole Roeberg, and Vince Coglianese; The Free Beacon‘s Adam Kredo and CJ Ciaramella; RollCall HOH‘s Neda Semani and Warren Rojas; Fox News contributor Jim Pinkerton; WaPo‘s Alexandra Petri; U.S. News‘ Steven Nelson; The Daily Beast‘s Eli Lake; and Donald Rumsfeld‘s former chief of staff Keith Urbahn. Conspicuously absent were Matthew Boyle and Martosko, who had kid duty. We rode the elevator with him down to the garage. He puffed away on what may have been an illegal cigar the whole way down and said Rahn and Weinstein would know he was there “in spirit.”

Quotable:

• “He’s a bit of a self promoter.”– Keith Urbahn on his former boss Donald Rumsfeld, who was Defense Secretary under former Prez George W. Bush. Urbahn spilled that Rummy is currently working on a new book. UPDATE: Urbahn writes in to tell us he was talking about his other former boss, The Daily Beast‘s David Frum.

• Asked about former and recently fired Daily Caller reporter Michelle Fields, Daily Caller Editor-in-Chief Tucker Carlson said, “I haven’t seen her much on TV lately. That ended for some reason.” Fields was not in attendance.

• “I don’t want to be written about.”– Steven Nelson, after FishbowlDC inquired about his job at U.S. News, which he only recently started.

• “I’m holding out for the chance that Matthew Boyle shows up.”– FBDC’s Peter Ogburn.

It’s tradition to play drinking games while listening to political speeches. Taking shots every time Newt Gingrich says “frankly,” for example. Or gulping each time former President Clinton says a habitual “now listen.” But over sharing is never a good idea. Especially on Twitter, where the rules are murky and trouble can come fast.

Last night, things may have gotten carried away for associate editor to The Atlantic Brian Fung. “JAMESON SHOTS HAPPENING #literally #DNC2012 #imsodrunkicanttweet,” he tweeted during Vice President Joe Biden‘s Democratic convention speech.

In a flash, Fung deleted the tweet. But deleting a tweet doesn’t save a potentially drunken reporter from others who manually retweet their remarks. Politico‘s Tim Mak captured Fung’s tweet in a retweet.

RT @b_fung: JAMESON SHOTS HAPPENING #literally#DNC2012#imsodrunkicanttweet

— Tim Mak (@timkmak) September 7, 2012

Fung denies the charge. “I stepped away from my laptop to go upstairs for a minute and a friend of mine hopped on my Tweetdeck while I was gone,” Fung told FishbowlDC. “Nobody in the house was actually drunk or drinking at the time.”

UPDATE: The true “mastermind” behind the drunken tweet writes in…

Read more

The normally mild-manner C-SPAN just has one thing to say to the idiotic GOP Senator from Georgia, Saxby Chambliss, who is whining that C-SPAN is at the root of the deeply divided Senate: Check out your 599 C-SPAN appearances. A quick piece of advice: Maybe an intern can count up your C-SPAN appearances before you decide to blast them next time, Senator? In response to Chambliss’s statements on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” and a subsequent story that appeared in Politico, C-SPAN tweeted the following zinger:

Want to see Sen. Saxby Chambliss’ (R-GA) 599 C-SPAN appearances?Go to his @cspanvl bio page: cs.pn/Hprwf3

— CSPAN (@cspan) March 30, 2012

Despite the childish slap from Chambliss, C-SPAN Spokesman Howard Mortman said “of course” the senator will be invited back on again. But not without a little ribbing from former C-SPAN CEO Brian Lamb, who told Politico‘s Tim Mak, “It’s like blaming the Bureau of Printing and Engraving for our $15 trillion debt.” Contrary to Politico‘s report, Lamb is now a top executive on the C-SPAN Board. He officially steps down as CEO today and begins his new role on April 1.

The Internet can be so obnoxious. Scribes have been writing us in the last several minutes about a mistake in Politico‘s story by Tim Mak. The piece is about former Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld nixing his subscription to the NYT on account of columnist Paul Krugman‘s Sept. 11 op-ed.

The graph in question in Politico is the second to last in the story and concerns Rumsfeld aide Dorrance Smith. Before being quickly corrected, the story named Smith as a “Close Krugman aide” as opposed to a Rumsfeld aide.

Close Rumsfeld [Krugman] aides have also had their share of criticism for the paper. In 2009, former Pentagon Assistant Secretary Dorrance Smith slammed the awarding of a Pulitzer Prize to the newspaper for a story. “Does the Pulitzer give prizes for works of fiction? Perhaps they just got the wrong category,” he said to US News and World Report.

Thankfully the mistake was fixed in a jiffy. Now readers can return to breathing.

Somehow Politico‘s Tim Mak missed the Drudge hit awarded to Foreign Policy Magazine’s The Cable blog last night for this story. The news, published on The Cable at 4:21 p.m. Monday, was that U.S. Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford was assaulted in Damascus.

By this morning at 9:03 a.m., Politico had published Mak’s story and didn’t bother crediting The Cable’s blogger Josh Rogin, who, understandably, was livid and wrote Mak to complain.

Just moments ago, Politico tucked Rogin and The Cable into its fourth graph. This was four hours after their story first published. Better late than never. This is precisely how they handled CLICK’s thievery of our recent Kardashian wedding item — a day later they were kind enough to add a citation. Good for them for at least redeeming themselves and giving credit where it’s due.

Still, as the old saying goes, cheaters never prosper.

We’ve requested a comment from Politico Editor John Harris.

It’s just after 9 a.m. and the morning is already dripping with apologies and regret.

Shortly after 6 a.m., TIME‘s Mark Halperin called President Obama a d*ck  on “Morning Joe.” Politico‘s Andy Barr and Patrick Gavin were first in Washington to tweet on the matter. “I thought he was a d*ck yesterday,” Halperin told the morning panel. Scarborough immediately called out for a delay. “Delay that, delay that,” he said. Not even an hour later the apologies began flowing and at 7:07 a.m. a full story appeared on Politico‘s website by Tim Mak. Halperin took “full responsibility” for his gaffe and apologized.

But on cable TV one apology is never enough, as evidenced by Ed Schultz‘s recent on-air apology fest to Conservative Commentator Laura Ingraham for calling her “a slut.” Just after 8 a.m. more apologies ensued on “Morning Joe.” This time, however, it was more of a family apology as the entire show took responsibility for Halperin’s use of profanity. “We goaded you into saying it, we didn’t think you were going to say it,” co-host Mika Brzezinksi reasoned. At this point viewers listening closely could hear an audible and defensive “Well…” out of co-host Joe Scarborough, who then trailed the others into a sort of collectively awkward apology zone and said Halperin wanted to be “totally clear.”

This set the stage for yet another Halperin apology: “I want to be totally clear. I can’t explain why I did it. It was inappropriate. It was disrespectful. I’ve already apologized. I will again to the President and say, I’m sorry. I’m sorry to viewers. It was the kind of thing that I can’t really explain, but I take full responsibility for it. It was a mistake and as I said, disrespectful, and I shouldn’t have said it.”

Scarborough interjected, “And Mika and I certainly apologize to the viewers.”

But Halperin wasn’t done. He had more to add. “What I said was disrespectful to the President, but it also lowers our discourse and coarsens our discourse and it’s just not appropriate on any level,” he said.

Scarborough also soon jumped back on the apology boat. “This was a mistake on a variety of levels,” he continued. “We all share it and we all apologize.” The camera then turned to co-host Willie Geist, who also, inexplicably, apologized. “We pride ourselves on not being that kind of show,” he said in what was assumed to be a wrap-up of the apology segment. “Today there was a slip by Mark Halperin. He’s a great reporter, and we won’t bore you with the whole back story, but he didn’t intend to say it on television. We apologize for the entire show.”

Next up: Apologies from the control room. Let’s begin with Alex, the employee likely to get a severe seven-second delay button training later today: Scarborough: “Just say you’re sorry, Alex.” Alex, with obvious fright in his voice, dutifully replied, “I’m profoundly sorry as well.” But Scarborough couldn’t leave it alone and this was probably the most comical part of Apologalooza. “What about TJ? We usually blame TJ for everything.”

The camera panned to a rather unemotional TJ in the control room.

“Sure, I’m sorry,” he said, in what was the most lackluster apology of the show.

UPDATE: MSNBC has suspended Halperin indefinitely.