After regreting some of the things he said the other night during a speech at Ohio University, (like saying The New York Times was a “cesspool of bias” and calling Times reporters a “lying bunch of scum”), Fox News co-founder and chairman Roger Ailes has been proven right on one of his claims: that Jon Stewart is a self-described “socialist.”

Newsbusters dug up the video from “Larry King Live” in 2000:

Reuters columnist Jack Shafer argues that the audience for cable news has peaked:

The consensus view put the onus on the Web: Now when big news breaks, the polled pundits agreed, the curious go to the Web (often via their mobile device) instead of cable news. Outside the Beltway‘s Doug Mataconis speculated that the potential audience for overtly liberal (MSNBC) and overtly conservative (Fox) TV news had maxed out.

Other possible reasons for the cable news slump is that the three channels (plus CNN’s subsidiary channel, HLN), approached maximum carriage on large cable systems years ago. Upwards of 90 percent of U.S. households already subscribe to cable or satellite TV, and most carry the news channels, so there are very few eyeballs out there that would like to tune in to CNN, Fox News and MSNBC but can’t.

As we have written about before, and as Shafer notes, the cable news channels spend an inordinate amount of time covering banal political maneuvers (despite Howard Kurtz‘s erroneous argument). Politics is an inherently difficult field of news to cover objectively, as, with the exception of journalists, essentially everyone interested in the day-to-day political coverage is already engaged and extremely biased.

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This morning was the 100th edition of “CBS This Morning,” the morning news program launched by CBS in January.

“We are at a point now where the operations of the show are a well-oiled machine, or at least getting there,” EP of “CBS This Morning” Chris Licht tells TVNewser. “Everyone is in a rhythm, they know what their job is, we have some stability, and now we are at the end of phase one of many phases, and now it is just every day looking to make it better.”

The anniversary was not the focus of the show, but it was given a brief mention at the end by anchors Erica Hill, Gayle King and Charlie Rose. On social media platforms, producers sparked conversation with viewers using the #100Mornings hashtag.

“For a show like this to launch cleanly, every part of this building had to really reinvent themselves,” Licht says. “Because we did things differently, from the engineering department to the editing department, photography, everybody had to be on board with this, and there is no way we would have launched so cleanly had not everyone in the building really pulled together under Jeff [Fager] and David [Rhodes] and said ‘ok, we are going to make this work.’”

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The Sunday show ratings see-saw continued unabated last week, with NBC’s “Meet the Press” reclaiming the top spot in both total and demo viewers. CBS’ “Face the Nation” was a close second in both categories.

ABC’s “This Week,” “Fox News Sunday” and “Al Punto” rounded our the top five.

All of the programs were down in both total and demo viewers compared to the same week a year ago.

Rebroadcasts of “Meet the Press” on MSNBC and NBC added 1.04M and 470,000, respectively.

“Face the Nation” is based on the first half-hour only, as the full contiguous hour airs in just 64% of the country.

The numbers for May 20:

As we noted, CNBC anchors remembered their friend and colleague Mark Haines yesterday. Haines died unexpectedly a year ago.

On her CNN program, Erin Burnett, who spent more than five years next to Haines at the CNBC anchor desk, delivered a heartfelt remembrance of her former colleague:

• In his return to television hosting, Regis Philbin fills in for Piers Morgan Tuesday night. Regis gets a rare interview with “Late Show” host David Letterman.

• “Nightline” is poised to win the May sweep after winning the week of May 14. It’s the 8th straight week the ABC news show has topped Letterman and Leno in Total Viewers as well as A25-54 and A18-49 viewers.

• Bill Owens, the executive editor of “60 Minutes,” will receive an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Towson University’s College of Fine Arts and Communication today.

HLN made it official today, announcing it will broadcast the 39th annual daytime Emmy Awards next month. The daytime Emmys will be presented Saturday, June 23 at 8pmET, at The Beverly Hilton hotel.

“HLN is thrilled to work with NATAS to celebrate some of television’s best programs and performances,” said HLN SVP and general manager Scot Safon. “Every day we focus on the news and information people talk about, and that has included extensive coverage of the Daytime Emmys in the past. This year, we’re very excited to also be carrying the event itself.”

At next month’s event, Barbara Walters will present Bill Geddie, Executive Producer of “The View” and the “Barbara Walters Specials,” with the Daytime Lifetime Achievement Award.

Anderson Cooper is nominated as best talk show host, along with Dr. Oz, Rachel Ray, Regis Philbin and Kelly Ripa and the doctors from “The Doctors.” “Anderson” is also nominated in the Best Informative Talk Show category alongside “Dr. Oz” and “The Doctors.”

CBS has televised the broadcast the last two years. In 2009, the CW aired the show. And in prior years, the Daytime Emmys aired on ABC, CBS and NBC.

AdWeek‘s Mike Shields reports that NBCUniversal is in talks with Microsoft to buy the tech company’s stake in MSNBC.com.

Several sources with first-hand knowledge of the situation say that negotiations between the two companies have progressed to the stage where NBCU parent company Comcast is conducting its due diligence. They said that the partnership could be unwound by this summer.

A spokesperson confirmed to TVNewser that conversations were taking place between the two companies.

Microsoft sold a majority stake in the cable channel MSNBC to NBCU back in 2005, but it maintained control of the website, which is an enormously popular online destination.

The deal, if consummated, could result in two separate websites, NBCNews.com and a reworked MSNBC.com, according to an NBC News staffer.

Inside NBC, there has been talk of a new website for weeks. The site is believed to be NBCNews.com, which would serve as a news hub, as well as the online home for programs like “NBC Nightly News,” “Meet the Press” and “Rock Center.” MSNBC.com would probably serve as the home for the cable channel’s politically-focused programming and news.

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25-54 demographic (Live +SD)

• Total day: FNC: 301 | MSNBC: 129 | CNN: 92 | HLN: 94

• Primetime: FNC: 400 | MSNBC: 255 | CNN: 111 | HLN: 139

	5p:	6p:	7p:	8p:	9p:	10p:	11p:	12a:
FNC	TheFive:	Baier:	Shep:	O’Reilly:	Hannity:	Greta:	O’Reilly:	Hannity:
	367	314	301	448	404	345	469	322
MSNBC	Matthews:	Sharpton:	Matthews:	EdShow:	Maddow:	O’Donnell:	EdShow:	Maddow:
	109	139	147	194	327	242	168	166
CNN	Blitzer:	KingUSA:	Burnett:	Cooper:	Morgan:	Cooper:	Burnett:	Morgan:
	83	88	88	85	88	158	114	89
HLN	Special:	Prime:	VelezMitchell:	Grace:	DrDrew:	Grace:	Showbiz:	DrDrew:
	75	75	81	145	118	154	133	91

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Sean Hannity has re-upped with Fox News Channel, signing a multi-year contract that keeps him in his current role through at least 2016.

“Hannity’s years of experience and thought-provoking commentary will continue to engage and excite loyal viewers,” Fox News chairman Roger Ailes said in a statement. “He is a remarkable asset to the network and we are happy that he’ll remain in his current role.”

Hannity has been with Fox News since the network launched in 1996. His 9pmET program, “Hannity,” is the second most-watched cable news show, averaging 2.1 million viewers a night.

“It’s been an honor and a privilege to work alongside the incredible team at Fox News, whose talent is unparalleled. In true Roger Ailes form, he saw something in me that no one else did and afforded me the opportunity to achieve incredible success,” Hannity said in a statement. “I look forward to many more years to come.”