Covering the Fires: Evening Notes

• MSNBC is putting a political spin on their coverage of the fires. Tonight on Hardball with Chris Matthews, California’s Lt. Gov. John Garamendi said he’s “got some doubt about the value of President Bush coming out here” and “I just hope if he does come, he brings more than he brought to New Orleans.” The comments were then repeated and discussed on Countdown with Keith Olbermann and on Live with Dan Abrams. We’ll see how this gets picked up tomorrow…

• Harry Smith anchors CBS’ The Early Show from southern California. Smith will be joined by Dave Price.

• The son of NBC’s Lester Holt, Stefan Holt, filed a report on how the fires are affecting his fellow Pepperdine students. That report wound up on Fox News’ Fox Report with Shepard Smith. The report was done for the college network of broadcasters called The Palestra. Earlier today, FNC announced exclusive carriage of The Palestra reports. Newly-promoted FNC SVP Joel Cheatwood championed the project while he was at CNN. It was his goal to bring The Palestra to FNC.

The CNN iReports, FNC uReports and MSNBC First Person reports continue coming in from citizen journalists on the ground. CNN.com, through iReport, is posting messages from those evacuted allowing friends and family to know they’re safe.

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