Ben Silverman, the current co-CEO for NBC Universal who has been rumored for months to be getting the heave-ho, looks poised to re-up in his current power position, the L.A. Times claims.

On Thursday, NBC parent company General Electric Co. added Silverman to the board of the Peacock Equity Fund, a $250-million media investment vehicle owned by NBC Universal and GE Commercial Finance. Earlier in the week, Silverman sat across the table from interviewer-of-the-moguls Charlie Rose to hold forth on the future of digital entertainment, television and advertising.

And then there was a curious item on the New York Post’s Page Six last week that all but left bus tire treads on Katherine Pope, who runs NBC’s in-house TV studio, which produced the network’s failed series “My Own Worst Enemy.”

The item, which many in Hollywood speculated was spin to take the heat off Silverman, blamed Pope for NBC’s struggles in prime time.

Silverman has been engaged in negotiations for a new contract that would extend his tenure as co-chairman of NBC Entertainment and Universal Media Studios beyond June, when his current contract expires. A person close to the situation says a deal could be reached by the end of the year.

Sorkin Finds Losing Is A Bitch: In a sit-down with Aaron Sorkin, Patrick Goldstein (an avowed Sorkin fan, like ourselves) writes that Studio 60 failed on the weight of its own bad premise more than anything else. Sorkin, though, seems to blame a number of factors — not the least of which is the fact that everyone in town wanted it to fail: “TV has a very measurable effect on our national mood. When TV gets bitchy and pissy, you find Americans getting bitchy and pissy too.”

Carrying A Joke Too Far: Ben Silverman and Marc Graboff, new co-chairmen of NBC Entertainment and Universal Media Studios got bloggers, like, um, us to announce that Rosie O’Donnell will appear on Donald Trump’s The Apprentice. But it’s not happening.

Becks Ankle Rankles Some: Vaunted soccer star/metrosexual-about-town David Beckham will have to delay his debut. Why are you looking at us blankly? He was supposed to start playing soccer for the Galaxy, don’t you remember? Soccer. That’s why he’s here. Never mind. Just keep looking at his pretty pictures.