The Tape: "Free Airtime," Courtesy Al Jazeera

"The State Department on Friday asked the government of Qatar to discourage Al-Jazeera from broadcasting a videotaped speech by Osama bin Laden," the Associated Press reports, citing a senior official.

Al-Jazeera spokesman Jihad Ali Ballout says his station "has established itself as maintaining an independent editorial policy" and based decisions on what to air on newsworthiness. "I don't think anybody would disagree as to the high news value of the bin Laden tape," he said. Other notes:

> FOXNews.com headlines the story "October Surprise."

> "Think of it as an al Qaeda campaign message with free airtime," Cory Bergman writes.

> Neil Cavuto joked that bin Laden was wearing a Kerry-Edwards campaign button during his taped message today," DCRTV Dave says.

> Brad e-mails in an observation: "ABC's Peter Jennings called the Osama bin Laden transcript 'quite fasinating, and disgusting to read.'" After a tape of campaign trail reactions, "he apologized for his earlier comment, saying, 'probably not appropriate of me to characterize the tape as I did as disgusting.'"

The Ticker: MSNBC #'s...Arafat...O'Reilly...

> On his radio show today, Bill O'Reilly asked about his lawsuit: "Why is this such a big story?" (Thanks Johnny Dollar)

> Ed notes that CNN was first with the Arafat departure news at 1am Friday morning, followed by FNC, then MSNBC.

> Good signs for MSNBC: On Wednesday night Hardball averaged a 0.9, 48% ahead of CNN in total audience. Countdown earned a 0.6, 28% ahead of CNN in the demo. At 8pm, MSNBC beat Paula Zahn in the demo or total HH's -- or both -- the first three nights of the week.

> "For the first time ever, CBS News will use geographic information system (GIS) to generate maps for its 2004 election coverage," this press release says.

> The Bee's Josh duLac profiles Laura Ingle, a regular panelist on FNC's On The Record and the woman "widely considered to be the hardest working member of the Peterson trial media circus."

Donahue on MSNBC: A "Very, Very Unhappy Time"

On Hannity & Colmes Thursday night, Phil Donahue recalled his tenure with MSNBC. "What happened at MSNBC?," Sean Hannity asked bluntly. "Well, we were the only anti-war voice that had a show, and that, I think made them very nervous," he responded. "I mean from the top down, they were just terrified." He called it a "very, very unhappy time," and said he felt "isolated"...

CBS Details Election Coverage Plans

CBS Newspath outlines its plans for election night in this internal message. "CBS News will provide live coverage of CAMPAIGN 2004: ELECTION NIGHT to all stations, 7:00pm-2:00am. CBS News will guarantee coverage until 2:00am" ET. "However, if the President has not been elected by 2:00am [ET], CBS News will stay with coverage until 3:00am [CT] after which time, a decision will be made hourly with regard to length of coverage." Here are all the details...

FNC In Wal-Mart On Nov. 2

Fox News Channel's election night coverage will air in 2,620 Wal-Mart stores Tuesday night. "Fox is looking to give viewers a seamless, store-to-home election connection, so that shoppers picking up lightbulbs or marked-down Halloween candy will be encouraged to continue watching FNC or their Fox affiliate when they get home," B&C's John Eggerton writes...

O'Reilly Sex Suits: It's All About The Money

> The NY Daily News cites sources as saying "O'Reilly will have to pay Andrea Mackris at least $2 million - and possibly as much as $10 million."

> "She must have gotten a lot of money," lawyer Suzanne Bracker, who is not involved with the case, tells the NY Post.

> Lisa Bloom told CNN: "There are still unanswered questions. And of course the biggest one is, what is the dollar amount of the settlement and who paid it? Was it Bill O'Reilly individually? Fox News? News Corp.? We'll probably never know the answer to that."

CNNfn Closing: Morning Newspaper Wrap

> Quoting Variety: "The decision was made "in order to redirect resources to CNN proper, Headline News and potential new products such as high-tech delivery systems for content (think streaming Internet)."

> Lisa de Moraes leads with the fact that CNNfn was never even rated by Nielsen. "CNN executives said that distribution limitations were largely to blame," Bill Carter leads.

> The bottom line: "Since the very beginning of CNNfn, the network had fought a battle for distribution," former CNN exec Dvid Bernknopf says. "It never succeeded in that arena and it therefore proved impossible for the network to attract enough viewers to make it appealing to enough advertisers."

O'Reilly Sex Suits: Statement Invites Speculation

> Beldar, a "trial lawyer who's handled both sides of sexual harassment cases," speculates on the statement: "The press release announcing the settlement undoubtedly was closely negotiated," he says. As for the rumored price tag: "Just think of it as history's highest-priced phone sex."

> H. Kurtz: "The deal likely involves payment of millions of dollars to Mackris, since the two sides were discussing an offer of well over $2 million when negotiations broke down, say sources close to O'Reilly."

3 Corrections In 1 Week For Howard Kurtz

Maybe three-a-day is too much for Howard Kurtz.

As this site has tracked, last week Kurtz screwed up statistics relating to Jon Stewart's Crossfire appearance. On Saturday he said Brian Williams anchored NBC coverage of the 1986 Challenger disaster. Now on Wednesday, Kurtz said that NBC's Jim Miklaszewski was embedded during the Iraq war. Mik is the network's Pentagon correspondent; the closest he came to embedding was spending all night at the network's Pentagon bureau.

But that's not what Kurtz's WP story said. "NBC's Jim Miklaszewski, who was embedded with the Army's 101st Airborne Division during the war, reported Monday that the unit visited the Qaqaa weapons facility on April 10, 2003..."

Does anyone want to volunteer as a fact-checker?...